


Coulrophobia

by Are_you_ever_not_going_to_fall_for_that



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Angst, Case, Fear, Flashbacks, Gen, Guilty Sam, Horror, Repressed Memories, Scared Sam, Scary Clowns, Season/Series 07, coulrophobia
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-06
Updated: 2016-02-24
Packaged: 2018-02-16 09:58:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 21
Words: 34,169
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2265435
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Are_you_ever_not_going_to_fall_for_that/pseuds/Are_you_ever_not_going_to_fall_for_that
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sam's fear of clowns is more complicated then even he knows. Takes place during Season 7.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I don't own Supernatural

1997

"Hey Sam." Sam turned around and saw his friend, but today he didn't look his friend, he was wearing a clown costume. Complete with a painted face of a clown and orange hair. Sam turned around immediately and stared in the opposite direction of his friend.

"What's the matter Sam?" Sam couldn't even look at him again. He didn't know what it was about clowns that freaked him out so bad, but they just gave him the creeps. Like there was something deep in his subconscious that screamed every time he saw one, accompanied by a feeling of absolute dread in the pit of his stomach.

"Sam?"

"I hate Halloween." Sam turned around, resolutely he looked down at the floor but not at the overly large shoes Todd was wearing.

"I know, you told me a million time when I tried to get you to dress up."

"It's high school."

"So, it's Halloween...so you're not going to look at me just because I'm dressed up you hate Halloween that much?"

"I don't like clowns." Sam admitted quietly, so that no one else would hear him.

"Clowns are creepy, that's why I dressed as one, but I shouldn't be surprised since you won't come over to my house tonight to watch horror movies."

"I don't like Halloween." Sam repeated. He had to hunt tonight, but for once he hadn't tried to get out of it. He didn't like horror movies, he had enough horror in his life, so he didn't want to spend any time he wasn't hunting watching horror movies. He honestly didn't care if they thought he was a wimp because they were leaving the next day and he probably would never see them again. He just had to get through today and without looking at Todd again.

"Well I get to get to class, see you later?" Sam nodded and waved his hand and heard Todd walking away.

2012

Fred was a farmer, had been his whole life. So had his father and his father's father, all the way back to the colonial times. It wasn't a big city job with a briefcase and a suit but he liked it that way. He was a simple man who was perfectly happy with his wife and three children in their cozy little town.

Fred was driving home from the hardware store after having gotten some supplies to fix up their shed, like his wife had been nagging him to do for weeks now. It was night and the loud noise of his car that was over a decade old was his only company. The radio on his car was broken and had been for ages, much to the disdain of his children. However, Fred liked it, the quietness, just him and his engine which was why he hadn't gotten it fixed when it had broke a few years ago. His engine suddenly sputtered and died. Fred look down at his car with a frown, it was old but it was usually reliable, other then the radio he kept the car in good condition. Fred tried to turn on the car again but nothing happened. Fred sighed, rifled through the glove box to find a flashlight, pulled the hood release and then pushed his body out of the car. He opened the hood of his car and looked down at it with a flashlight trying to figure out what was wrong with it.

A few minutes in his process of checking he heard a noise from somewhere behind him. He turned around and moved his flashlight back and forth. The road he had been driving on was through Ben's farm land. There was only pumpkins around and nothing at all looked any different from the way it usually would. Fred turned back to his car when a louder sound came and Fred immediately turned around again. This time thoroughly searching using his flashlight for anything that could be making the noises he was hearing. He found nothing still, but he was thoroughly creeped out now, the feeling that something was wrong was in the air, he grabbed his cell phone from his back pocket and dialed his wife's phone.

"Hello." her sweet voice came over the line.

"Margery my car stalled about 5 minutes from the house and I can't seem to get it working again, can you come and pick me up?" he worked hard to make sure that his voice was even, he didn't want Margery to think he was scared.

"Sure I'll be there soon okay honey?" she said sweetly.

"I'll be here, thanks Margery."

"Bye."

"Bye." he headed towards his car at a fast pace. It occurred it him it was probably nothing and he was probably just making a mountain out of a mole hill, but the feeling that something was wrong just wouldn't go away. Even so that when he got into his car he locked it. He kept glancing down at his phone, as he waited for the time which seemed to crawl by. Why wasn't his wife there yet?

A loud noise and sudden pain hit him. It took him a moment to gain his senses again and saw that someone had broken his window, and the pain was from the glass hitting the side of his face that had been towards it. The door opened and there was a figure standing there, Fred's vision was too blurry though to see the figure clearly but it stood there just outside of his car for a moment. The figure starting getting clearer the more he looked at it, but before he could tell who it was he was thrown from the car several feet away. His already blurry vision got a lot blurrier as his head hit the ground hard.

He saw three blurry figures walking towards him slowly and tried to get up, but his limbs were too uncoordinated. The figures stopped right in front of him and stared down at him for a moment, the figures image were becoming a little clearer again and he only saw two of them at the moment. Then the pain hit. the pain that made all the amounts of pain he had ever had in his life including breaking his leg when he was 16 falling off the roof pale in comparison. He screamed for a few moments before he stopped.

Margery pulled up behind her husband's vehicle and turned off the car. She waited for a moment, waiting for her husband to come into view. After several moments she thought maybe he didn't notice that she was there. She opened her door and walked towards her husbands car, then she saw it. Her husband driver side window was broken and when she had saw it last it hadn't been broken. She quickened her gait a little and opened her mouth to ask what had happened to the window, when she got alongside the window, only to find her husband not there and small puddles of blood on the seat. A cold feeling of dread settled in her stomach, her husband was injured she had to find him. She looked up the road and back the way she came for her husband but couldn't see him.

She searched the area around the car, but she couldn't see very much. She took out her cell phone and held it out like a flashlight searching the area back and forth until she saw something. She started stepping towards what she saw with a feeling of dread in her stomach that got heavier with every step she took towards it. She didn't realize that she was going slowly, only felt the dread which intensified into outright terror as she realized it was man lying there, she spurred into action and ran forward until she saw that the man was her husband and he was missing his head.

"Ahhhh!"

~.~

Dean sat down and put Sam's salad in front of him Sam picked up the fork and looked on as Dean picked up his burger and took a large bite of it.

"So I got a hunt." Sam said. He put a print out of a news article on the table. He ate some of his salad while Dean read the article then looked up with a smile.

"Farmer Fred lost his head." Sam grimaced at the rhyming but didn't say anything else.

"What makes this our thing?"

"Pattern from the road he was found on, he's the fourth victim in four months."

"Where?" Dean said apparently on board.

"Pleasant Grove, Idaho,"

"I guess we're going to Idaho after dinner." Dean said then took another big bite of his burger. Sam grimaced but focused his attention back of his salad.


	2. Chapter 2

Dean took the off ramp into town and was soon cruising down a street full of shops.

"Small towns." Dean said. Dean didn't have to travel very far to find a hotel and when he did he pulled into the parking lot. Dean opened his door and closed it. As Sam waited for Dean to return from checking them in he realized he felt ill at ease. Sam looked around the parking lot and found no one looking at him but that didn't stop the feeling the feeling of dread that seemed to permeate his being. Sam looked around the parking lot again, he was looking through the passenger's side window when Dean's door opened Sam jumped and turned around. Dean was looking at him concerned.

"You okay?" Sam nodded his head, there was nothing around, it was just a weird feeling. Dean got into the car and moved them over a bit then re-parked the car. Dean handed him a key and got out of the car. Sam realized the feeling hadn't gone away at all, he looked around again and still there was no one out there but him and Dean. Sam shook his head and got out of the car as well, grabbed his bag from the still open back and shut the trunk. They were going to have to get a new car after this job. He quickened his pace to make sure he was right behind Dean and caught the door before it closed. He put his stuff down on the bed closest to the bathroom and took out his laptop and got down to researching.

There seemed to be no link to any of the people except that they had all died on Maple Street. However Maple street was much longer then he thought it was at first, it was nearly 5 miles long and it was the longest and busiest street in the middle. The outside fringe was where Frank Johnson farm happened to be when he was killed. They were going to have to talk to family of the deceased to find out more information. He open his mouth to tell Dean when he caught movement out of the corner of his head. He whipped his head only to see nothing. The hotel only had him and Dean, the feeling of dread increased. He shook his head, there was nothing there, Dean was looking perfectly as peace it was just something weird going on with him. He looked around again just for good measure then turned his attention back to Dean.

"We're going to have to interview the family." Dean grimaced.

"Monkey suits?" Sam nodded even though Dean wasn't really asking. They got changed into their FBI suits and Sam slicked his hair back using the mirror on the outside of the bathroom, the fear started creeping in again. He looked around, he didn't even see Lucifer, hadn't seen him in a few hours that was a little weird. If it weren't for this huge feeling of terror he'd be grateful.

"You done primping Sam?" Dean asked. Sam rolled his eyes but followed his brother back to the car. Some time later they pulled up to the house, opened the door to the car, walked up the walkway to the house and rang the doorbell. It took a few moments before someone opened the door. It was a middle age woman with a very sad look in her red rimmed eyes. He put his best sympathetic getting-answers-out-of-grieving-people-face on.

"Mrs. Johnson?" Sam asked.

"Yes." she said weakly while nodding slightly. "I'm agent Smith and this my partner Agent Smith. We're with the FBI."

"The police already questioned me."

"I'm sorry but we need to do our own investigation." she stared at them for a long moment then nodded slowly. She gestured that they could come in, Sam and Dean stepped over the threshold and into the living room. It had 2 tan couches and a red love seat set in a circle. There was a light wooded coffee table in the middle of the 3 pieces of furniture. Around the outside of the furniture were cases full of elephants and doilies. All in all it was nice, a few too many doilies and elephant figurines for his taste but other than that nice. He still had the same feeling that something was wrong here. He scanned the room again for anything out-of-place, and came up empty. She gestured that they could sit on the couch which they did. Sam made himself look more relaxed and got into his FBI question asking persona.

"I'm just gonna need to ask you a few questions." he said sympathetically, she nodded sadly.

"Could you tell us what happened?"

"He called me he said his car wouldn't start.. he was only 5 minutes away from home." her voice cracked and tears started flowing down her face. "I went to go get him, I waited for him to come into the car but he didn't so I got out and saw that his window was broken and...I found him." she trailed off into sobs after a few moments she managed to stop. She grabbed for the box of Kleenex on her table and wiped at her eyes with it.

"Do you have any idea of who could have done this to him?" Sam asked, her face crumpled again but this time she managed to hold back the tears.

"No everybody loved him."

"Did Fred mention anything usual to you in the days before his death?" she looked confused.

"Unusual?"

"Strange, weird noises, sounds like rats, weird smells." she looked a little angry.

"No nothing like that." she said shaking her head. Sam put on his reassuring smile like everything was okay and she lost the angry look and went back to crying. He felt like someone was watching him he quickly turned his head. Only to find an elephant figurine looking at him. He looked at Dean who gave him a look that said. What? He shook his head as much Sam's for his benefit as it had been for Dean's. There was nothing there, there was nothing wrong. He smiled like there was nothing wrong at the woman who was now looking at him strangely. He nodded at Dean and Dean picked up the questioning. He did his best to pay attention but he couldn't seem to shake the feeling like something was watching him.


	3. Chapter 3

"Well that was a big frickin' load of nothing." Dean said, picking up his cheeseburger.

They had interviewed the other three families and all of them said the same thing: no evidence of haunting or any other clues. They were going over all the information at a burger joint, obviously Dean's idea. Sam was looking for any connection between the victims and Dean was gorging himself on a cheeseburger that had so much grease it was practically drowning in it. Dean of course didn't mind and seemed to look at the sandwich like it was a long lost love. Sam on the other hand had a salad but had long ago put it to the side to look over the information.

He wasn't really hungry and unfortunately Sam was having a bit of a hard time focusing. He couldn't say exactly what it was that was distracting him, although, he did know he didn't like this place. No not just the burger joint, though that in and of itself was enough to give him pause. It was clean enough but the booths were patched with fabrics that didn't match which gave the place a very tacky feel. Along with the fact that several of the bulbs in the light fixture overhead had burned out giving the diner uneven lighting.

It wasn't just the diner though; it was the whole town, which was still giving him the creeps. The motel, the houses, the victims were and especially this diner, it all gave him the creeps. There was absolutely no reason for him to feel this way. Dean didn't seem to notice anything off about the town; of course he at the moment wasn't noticing anything that wasn't his burger. But there was something wrong about this place, something very wrong. Some part of him was telling, to leave, to run away and never return again, even if Sam couldn't seem to find a solid reason for the feeling.

"Sam." Sam jumped and saw Dean looking at him strangely.

"You okay?" he didn't know what to say. He got a bad vibe from this place? He hadn't had vibes since yellow eyes died, and nothing looked wrong and even if it was they were hunters it was their job to fix it.

"I'm fine." he lied. Dean of course looked at him less than impressed.

"You are not fine. You've been jumpy ever since we pulled into this town." Dean said. Damn. Sam was hoping that Dean would let it go a bit longer. Especially since he wasn't really sure exactly what was going on and the last time he had had vibes was with his physic powers, and it was kind of something they didn't talk about.

"I don't like this town." it was more or less the truth and didn't get into his vibes. Dean looked at him, bemused.

"I knew I shouldn't let you watch that movie," Sam frowned confused.

"What?"

"That's why you don't like it right? That movie?" Sam stared at him even more confused.

"You know, from when we lived here before." Dean said with a nod like it was obvious.

"We've lived here before?" Sam asked, he didn't remember living here before; though it shouldn't surprise him. They moved around so much as kids they had pretty much lived everywhere but usually he remembered which towns he had lived in.

"Yeah, you don't remember that?" Dean asked. Sam shook his head searching his memories but coming up blank. He didn't remember this town at all.

"No."

"You were eight, I was thirteen. I don't remember that much about it, we only lived here for three months." Sam frowned trying to recall any memories but no matter how much he tried he came up blank. He was starting to feel sick so he pushed his salad a little further away from him than it had been before. Sam hoped that he wasn't coming down with something; that was the last thing that he needed. In an effort to focus on something else Sam blurted out, "What movie?" Dean smirked and Sam instantly knew he shouldn't have asked.

" _Nightmare Before Christmas_." Dean sobered up a bit. "I shouldn't have let you watch it…gave you nightmares. You kept thinking that there was something following you." Sam thought back to earlier at the house when he thought he felt something eyes on him.

"There wasn't, right?" Sam asked to make sure.

"Sam, there was no where more protected from anything then a house protected by hunters. I never saw anything, there was never any cold spots in the house or sounds like you would expect from a ghost. I salted the house six ways to Sunday, I asked Dad about anything that could be there and he tested the whole house out there was nothing." Sam nodded, that was good. Maybe it was just bad memories that he subconsciously remembered. Although if so, why didn't he remember it? He had been eight; he should be able to remember it, especially if he had been as scared as Dean said he was. Then again, Dean also said it was nothing and they had a case to solve. They were hunters and hunting was all about putting personal problems on the back burner until after the job.

Sam got back to the cases. He had to find out what was doing killing these people, stop it and get the hell out this town because it was giving him the creeps.

He was reading up on the town and found two more people who had died on Maple Street in strange accidents, increasing the number of people up to six. He was so focused on his laptop that when Dean opened the door Sam jumped and Dean looked at him, concerned. He was supposed to be a seasoned hunter, not the kind of person who got scared when a door opened. Dean's was carrying Chinese take-out, which was what he had gone out to get for dinner. Dean put down the Chinese food and looked at him, Sam avoided Dean's eyes and kept his own eyes on his laptop trying to figure out if there was a pattern to the deaths. Dean cleared his throat after a moment and Sam reluctantly looked up.

"Sam, are you okay?" Dean asked. Sam knew that tone of voice that was his _I'm-worried-about-you_ voice and generally was associated with Lucifer.

"I'm fine." he lied, he said and Dean sighed.

"Sam." he said slightly irritated.

"It's not him." Sam said because he knew that Dean was thinking it was. Dean didn't look like he believed him.

"Don't lie to me, you're looking at things that aren't there." Sam shook his head.

"It's not him, I haven't seen him since we got here." Which actually was kind of strange but before he could think further about that Dean yelled.

"Then what the hell is up with you? You're acting paranoid and scared and just plain weird." Sam shook his head again and shrugged not really knowing how to explain it since he didn't really know why he was feeling this way himself.

"I don't know...I...I just have a weird feeling."

"About what?" Dean asked concerned.

"About...I don't know...the whole town... there's nothing scary about it, it's just it creeps me out." Sam said, feeling foolish. He felt even more so when Dean looked at him incredulously.

"You deal with monsters on a daily basis and a normal everyday town and not even that scream Pleasantville kind of creepy freaks you out?" Sam nodded even though it made him feel foolish, he didn't understand it either. Dean's eyes left his and he seemed pensive, he looked up to meet his eyes.

"Maybe we should leave?" Dean suggested but Sam shook his head.

"No we're here, we're hunters, we have to do what we're supposed to do." Sam insisted.

"You already have Satan-vision and this town isn't meshing well with you, I think we should go." Dean said earnestly, concern evident in his eyes. Sam considered it for a second but only for a second before he shook his head.

"There aren't many hunters left and we're here," he couldn't let his little phobia of this town get in the way of saving lives. It was just a weird feeling he'd get over it.

"Sam-." Dean started most like to get him to reconsider.

"Dean." Sam countered firmly interrupting Dean, his face showing he wasn't going to be swayed from his decision. He wasn't going to let more people die just because he felt a little uncomfortable in this town. Dean huffed angrily and wrapped his arms around each other.

"Fine." 'For now' was unsaid but well understood.


	4. Chapter 4

Sam blinked a few times and then looked away from the laptop screen. He was getting a headache, which wasn't helped by the loud volume level of the TV. Dean was lying on his bed watching something that Sam didn't even want to try to figure out. Sam winced again and decided he was going to have to take some meds. He got up from his bed where he had been sitting with the headboard and groaned inwardly. He twisted himself around a bit, feeling stiff. How long how he been sitting in that position looking for information? It felt like ages, but he knew it probably hadn't been more than four hours. He made his way to his bag and found some Aspirin that he swallowed dry, not bothering to search for water. Dean happened to catch him, though and gave him a look.

"Headache." he explained as he made his way back to the bed and sat back down. He didn't look back at the computer quite yet since the meds hadn't kicked in.

"Maybe you should take a break. You've been going at it non-stop since we got here." Dean suggested with a shrug, trying for nonchalant even though Sam knew better. Sam shook his head. The feeling still hadn't gone away, but it was less noticeable while he was researching and once they found the monster and killed it they could leave. That part had practically become his mantra.' Find the monster, kill it, and leave Creepyville. Find the monster, kill it, leave Creepyville.' Sam focused on Dean's expression, which was easy to decipher as it was a familiar one; Dean was again going to try to talk him into leaving this place. Part of him wanted to allow Dean to take him away so he could leave the town.

"Sam-." Dean started.

"Dean no, anyone could be its next victim and I'm not going to let it take anyone else." The hair on the back of Sam's neck stood up and his eyes flashed to the corner of the room...where there was nothing but a table, nothing that should have called his attention. He flicked his eyes quickly back trying to pretend that he hadn't just been creeped out by a piece of furniture, especially not a particularly intimidating one. It was the standard for motel rooms like these: small, fitting a few people as long as they all sat really close to one another, slightly dirty from years of ground-in grime but not really all that special. No, it was just some random table.

"Sam-" Sam shook his head. Yes, he was scared. No, he didn't know why but he wasn't going to let anyone die just because he was scared of a table and of a town that wasn't even terrifying.

"Dean, please just let me do this," he begged.

"Okay." Dean said reluctantly after a few moments, then his eyes shifted back to the television screen. Sam noticed gratefully though that Dean also turned down the volume on the TV. Sam nodded and went back to researching.

~.~

Sam stared at the words on the screen. There was something there; he just had to figure it out. He was getting close when the same feeling like someone was watching him came over him again and Sam's head snapped to the left towards the bathroom. There was nothing there. Nothing there that would explain the fear he felt.

He glanced over at Dean who was asleep. Dean had fallen asleep while watching TV about an hour ago and Sam had turned it off. The only thing lighting the room was the glow of his laptop, which cast the items closest to him in a blue glow. Which might be scary looking to others, but he was used to it. He had researched many times in dark rooms. Sam snapped his head to the door as he felt the hair on the back of his neck stand up again. The only thing he saw though was the door locked and dead bolted with a line of salt across it, nothing else. He hated this feeling, this fear that had no explanation. He could deal with fear if he knew what was causing it and how to end it. But having no information, that was driving him nuts.

~o~

About an hour later Sam had decided that it had to be some sort of new torture that Lucifer had come up with. Sam wouldn't put it past him, especially since he hadn't seen Lucifer since entering this town. It was the only thing he could think of that made any sort of sense. Sam looked back at Dean this time envious because Dean was sleeping. He was exhausted: his muscles aching, bones tired, his adrenalin had been spiking all day due to the fear. Still he couldn't think about sleep yet, not until he found what was going on so they could leave.

Sam knew that he should tell Dean his theory when he woke up because he knew that his brother would want to know. He didn't want to share his theory though because he was afraid Dean would make them leave before the job was done, not that would do any good if he were right. He would just have to find it before Dean woke up then. Sam looked back down at the paper and tried to pick up where he had left off. He had been so close and now he couldn't even remember what it was that he had been thinking about. Dammit! He resisted the urge to crumple the piece of paper he was writing notes on into the tiny ball since that wouldn't help him with the case at all.

Instead he took a few deep breaths while he closed his eyes and calmed himself down. He wouldn't let Lucifer win. Sam would find the creature and end it, and if Lucifer continued this game into the next town he'd deal with it. He read the articles again of the six deaths he was pretty sure this was the tenth time he had read them. He focused again on the first one, a Gary Smith; there was something about his story that didn't fit with the others.

The other murders weren't linked to anyone; there were no suspects. But the article talking about Gary Smith hinted at the fact that it might have stemmed from a domestic dispute. Sam ripped apart Gary Smith's life. He found out that Gary had been recently divorced, his wife had cheated on him, and would have taken the house and kids in the separation. Because life had apparently not been fond of Gary Smith he had subsequently died violently in a car accident. An accident that may or may have not have been an accident, but his ex-wife who hadn't quite been his ex-wife yet had gotten all his insurance money. All the ingredients that made for a vengeful spirit. While ghosts usually had a type, they sometimes just haunted a particular stretch of road and took anyone who was unfortunate to travel it.

All in all he had a good guess on what it was they were after and he couldn't be happier. As soon as they got rid of the ghost they could get the hell out of this town. He just hoped that Lucifer wouldn't continue this game into the next town, if he did it may get very hard for Sam to do his job.

Sam looked away from the computer for the first time in hours and looked down at Dean who was apparently awake again and appeared to be watching some sort of infomercial for George Foreman grills. A quick glance at the alarm clock in the room let Sam know that it was 2 o'clock in the morning. It was late. He blinked down as he noticed the number of Styrofoam cups around him that indicated further how tired he was. He hadn't even noticed drinking that much coffee, even though it was an instant blend from the packets beside the motel's out-of-date coffee maker that was not the tastiest thing in the world. He was so tired his eyes kept slipping closed. He was exhausted even with his extraordinary resistance to sleep and being able to go for long periods without it that that he developed over the years. Both he and Dean had since the both of them often didn't sleep well, especially lately. Still Sam hated this town and wanted out of it as quickly as possible and if he had to drink a few more gulps of that swill the motel they were staying at called coffee then he would if it got him out of the stupid, creepy town.

Sam cleared his throat and Dean looked over at him, straightening up from his slouched position against the bed.

"So I think I found it." Dean looked at him expectantly.

"It looks like it's a ghost." Dean nodded.

"We haven't dealt with one of those in awhile."

"Yeah."

"So where's it buried?" Dean asked getting right down to business.


	5. Chapter 5

Dean unfortunately seemed to notice how tired Sam was. It might have had something to do with the fact that Sam hadn't thrown away any of the coffee cups that were around him before waking Dean up. Fortunately Dean seemed to recognize that there was no way that Sam was going to stay there another day if he didn't have to. Dean instead made Sam sleep for two hours, which Sam could admit if only to himself was a good idea, since if he hadn't slept at all he probably wouldn't have been alert enough to go toe to toe with a ghost. He maybe wasn't in peak form, but he hadn't really been in peak form for a while so it wasn't much different on that front.

The brothers, at the moment were on the road heading towards the cemetery. They were going to have to work quickly in order to dig up the grave before the sun came up, because with the sun came people seeing them and calling the police on them. Not something they were particularly fond of. Sam, although tired was also excited, which along with another few cups of coffee was keeping him awake and alert. He had found the ghost; at least, he hoped. It wouldn't be the first time he thought he had the right ghost and it had ended up being someone else he just hoped that he got the right one.

The car rumbled to a stop and Sam lamented again not being able to use the Impala as he made his way out of the more cramped passengers seat. Sam glanced around at all the tombstones and grave markers. When he was a kid doing this he hated the statues in graveyards because he had always felt like they were staring at him. He had the same feeling again. Sam took in a deep breath to steady his nerves. It was just a feeling, just a stupid feeling, once the body was gone they could leave this town and never come back.

Sam blinked and jerked slightly as he heard the sound of the trunk opening. The car they currently had a squeaky trunk hinge. It wasn't as well taken care of some of the other cars they had had. Sam turned around even though he felt uncomfortable turning his back on the graves. The optimism and excitement he had felt on the way over was ebbing slightly. Sam shook his head, no; they were one dug up grave from getting away from this town. He strode forward to the trunk and grabbed a shovel and flashlight while Dean grabbed the weapons duffel. Dean shut the trunk and the two of them simultaneously winced at the rusted hinges. It was a good thing they had already decided that they were getting another car after this hunt.

The brothers nodded to each other, deciding to split up for a little bit to search for the grave. It was always a little difficult finding the right grave; Sam had often wished that they buried people in alphabetical order even though he knew that it wasn't really feasible. Sam used the flashlight to look at the names on the stones, wishing that the clouds covering the nearly full moon would move back and make it easier to see. He was also trying extra hard to concentrate on grave stones so he wasn't focusing on the fact that he still had that horrible feeling, even if at that moment he didn't feel like anyone was watching him.

Sam had searched fruitlessly for nearly five minutes before he heard Dean call.

"Sam, I found it." Sam turned towards the only other beam of light in the graveyard and headed towards it, stopping in front of Gary Smith's grave next to his brother. Dean put down the duffel bag and took a shotgun out of it he turned to him.

"You want to go first or should I?" Sam looked between the shovel and the gun and shrugged.

"I'll go first." he said and stuck the shovel into the ground repeatedly. He found that he liked it more than usual. The burn in his arms was distracting him from the feeling of creepiness and his hatred of the place. Sam, as he normally did while digging graves, thought that rather than paying someone to dig graves at cemeteries, they should make it a Gym class and make people pay to dig the graves. He was sure that digging graves was one of the main reasons his brother was still so fit, even though he ate so much crap.

"Hey Energizer Bunny, you want me to take over?" Sam blinked and looked up at Dean. It wasn't often that he had to look up at Dean, but he was a few feet into the ground. He had gotten so lost in the feeling he hadn't even realized that he had gotten so far down.

"Yeah." Sam said, even though he wanted to continue. His arms were slightly sore at the moment, but if he tried to dig the entire grave they would probably be sluggish when the ghost actually came. He put the shovel down and pulled himself out of the grave. Dean handed him the shotgun and his jacket before lowering himself into the grave.

Sam kept a watch over the area while also shining a flashlight so Dean could see what he was doing. Creepiness, this place was full creepiness, which he immediately noticed again once he wasn't digging up a grave. Although most people would be creeped out digging a grave, it was something he had done several times. Sam had long ago grown used to being in cemeteries, digging graves up in the middle of the night.

"Haven't missed this part much." Dean said between shovelfuls of dirt. Sam nodded his head in agreement, even though he wished he were still the one digging the grave. If he were the one digging the grave he wouldn't feel the darkness, the eeriness that seemed to permeate the entire town. There was something wrong about being here and he had to get away.

Sam jumped as he heard Dean hit the coffin and cursed himself for it under his breath. Dean reached up for him and Sam helped Dean pull himself out of the grave. Sam had a strong stomach, he had to in his line of work or else he would probably be throwing up now. The body was still decomposing and smelled awful. Still he could handle it, if he could handle this why was being in this town giving him so much trouble? Right Lucifer, he remembered, it was his new form of punishment; it had to be since nothing else made any sense.

Sam blinked as the smell of gasoline hit his nostrils and realized that Dean was dousing the open grave with it, and that was of course when the ghost showed up.

Gary Smith looked pissed, of course most ghosts did when he tried to salt and burn their corpses. His skin was gray and he was a few inches shorter than Dean. That was all Sam was able to see before Gary threw him a few feet away before he could lift his gun. His arm clipped one of the tombstones sending a jarring pain through his upper arm. He grit his teeth even as he pulled himself into a standing position, just in time to see Dean go flying as well. Sam ran and picked up his fallen shotgun and shot the ghost who disappeared.

Dean ran up to him, Sam spotted the ghost appear again and managed to shoot it before it came into contact with his brother again. Dean was able to flick open his lighter and throw it into the open grave. Gary Smith shrieked in rage as his ghostly form was covered in flames. Sam eyes immediately sought out his brother looking for any injuries and found his brother's eyes doing the same to him. Dean's forehead was bleeding a little bit, but it didn't even look serious enough for stitches. There was always the chance of a concussion though, even if the injury didn't look too bad and Sam made a mental note to check on Dean later in case he did develop one as a result of the bump on his head.

"You okay?" Dean asked. Sam shrugged.

"Arm's a little banged up but other that I'm fine. You?"

"Forehead a little banged up but I'm fine too." Dean said and Sam nodded and asked the question he wanted to ask ever since they had entered the town.

"Can we get the hell out of this town now?" Dean nodded. Sam and Dean worked on filling in the grave. Dean did most of it since Sam's arm was injured. When he was finished Sam carried his shovel over his uninjured shoulder as he and Dean made their way to their temporary car. Sam threw the shovel into the trunk and made his way to the passenger's seat, Sam winced again at the tight fit. He couldn't wait until they got rid of this stolen car and replaced it with another one. Dean slid in to the driver's seat a moment later and started up the car. Dean smiled at him and turned on the radio so that 'Back in Black blared through the car's speakers and Sam found himself grinning as well. Dean hadn't taken his cassettes from car to car; instead they had to rely on radio stations.

They pulled away from the graveyard the both of them grinning because, really, as far as hunts went this one hadn't been bad. In fact a little cut and a bruised arm were pretty much good for them. Not to mention Sam was ecstatic about getting away from the town that was seriously giving him the biggest case of the creeps in his life. He kept in the back of his mind that this might be a game of Lucifer's; if it was it was going to make it very difficult to hunt. Sam brushed aside that thought quickly not wanting to think about it. Besides he got his brother and they were cruising to one of his brother's favorite tunes, leaving a town he hated, life was good. Life was finally-

Bam!

Sam heard a crunching sound, glass breaking, felt the car jolt and a sudden pain in his head before it all went black.


	6. Chapter 6

Dean opened his eyes slowly, expecting to see a motel room. However the smell was his first clue that he wasn't in a motel room. The overly clean antiseptic smell ran through his nostrils. No... he knew this smell. He opened his eyes all the way and it was confirmed, he was in a hospital. He looked down at himself, yep, hospital gown. Arm check; yep, IV. He tried to remember what had happened. He and Sam had been driving back to their motel and then their car had been hit by something... he remember the sound of the car being hit and the feeling of alarm... and a car. It had been another car that had hit them, he had barely seen it before it had crashed into their vehicle. There was something about it that... Dean's eyes widened and the heart monitor attached to him started speeding up as he realized that Sam wasn't sitting next to him. If Sam wasn't there that meant he was injured and Dean had to find him. He had to make sure that Sam was okay.

But first he had to get out of the bed and that involved taking all the stuff that on or in him off or out of him. Doing so was sure to attract attention but that was ok since it what he wanted anyways, someone that would tell him where his brother was. He decided to start with IV; he pulled it out, and then undid several other lines and last of all took off the heart monitor. He winced as the shrill beeping echoed through the room but he pulled himself out of bed anyways and stood a little shakily on his legs. As soon as he stood up he also felt nauseous, and felt a throbbing in his head, that had been there before only lesser when he had just been too distracted to give it much attention. However it was much worse now. It didn't matter though; he wouldn't be able to relax until he knew that Sam was okay. He started walking slowly out of the room when a nurse came in.

"Where's my brother?" Dean demanded. The nurse looked concerned but at the same time annoyed with her patient.

"Sir, you shouldn't be out of bed right now," she chided as she walked over to Dean and tried to force him back into bed. The good news was that even with a throbbing headache, and slightly shaky legs, the hunter was still able to overpower her.

"Sir, you need to get back in bed." The nurse insisted, no longer trying physically force him to cooperate but trying to intimidate instead. She also turned off the heart monitor which abruptly quieted the irritating beeping sound which was good for Dean's headache. Still, there was no way he was getting back into that bed without seeing Sam first.

"Not until you show me Sam."

"If you get back into bed I'll look into it," The nurse promised but Dean shook his head stubbornly.

"No, show me Sam then I'll get back into bed." Dean argued, not that he really had any intention on following through; the only person who could make him follow through was Sam.

"Sir." The nurse said, somewhat exasperated but trying to remain patient.

"Show me Sam." The nurse huffed and stepped away from Dean and went to his chart hanging at the foot of his bed. She looked at his chart and Dean caught her frown, his heart dropped into his stomach with worry about his brother. Where was Sam? How bad was he hurt? Was he even still alive?

"What's going on? Where's Sam? Is he okay?"

"Sir, according to your chart, you were the only one brought into the hospital."

"What?" Dean exclaimed in shock. That wasn't possible! Both he and Sam had been in the car when it had been hit Sam had to be there. Where else could he be?

"No, you're wrong. The chart must be wrong. My brother was with me in the car, he has to be here."

"I can try to see if there's been some mistake but you have to sit back down." It was the last thing in the world Dean wanted to do, sit down while his brother could be in trouble. But it was the only way he was going to get information so he guessed he had to. He reluctantly sat down on the hospital bed. The nurse came up and Dean said,

"No monitors." the nurse huffed then left. Dean waited anxiously for the nurse to come back and tell him that it had all been a mistake. That they had barred Sam from his room and that Sam was fine and just worried about him. It took ten minutes before the nurse came back this time with a doctor in tow.

"Where is Sam?" he said getting to his feet. The doctor looked at him.

"You were the only person found in the car that crashed." Dean's mind flashed to the moment right before the crash when he had seen another car speed into them.

"What about the other driver?" He asked, wondering who it was he was going to kill if he couldn't find his brother. The doctor looked down at the clipboard in front of him.

"There was no other driver found at the scene." That definitely sent a red flag up in Dean's mind. The car that crashed into them had been going pretty fast, the driver would have had to be injured. Dean couldn't stay here anymore; he had to find out what was going on. He stood up and started towards the door.

"Sir, you shouldn't be going anywhere." Dean shook his head and stopped when it made the throbbing worse.

"I can't stay here, I have to find Sam."

"You sustained a concussion. It's really not advisable that you go anywhere." Dean knew the signs of a concussion. President – Obama, check. Year-2012-another check. So while Dean may have had a concussion when he came in, whenever that was, he no longer had one now.

"I'm not staying here. I have to find Sam, so give me the AMA forms." Dean said he had been in enough hospitals in his life to know the procedure of how to get out of the hospital when the doctors didn't want you to.

"Sir, that's not a good idea," the doctor said with a shake of his head, "you have a serious head injury. It's best if you stay here overnight for medical observation."

"You don't get it! I have to find my brother! I need to make sure he's okay! Give me the damn AMA forms!" Dean shouted. The doctor nodded and moved out of the room.

"Sweetheart, you mind getting me some clothes?" Dean asked, giving the nurse his best smile. She didn't seem as taken by him as they usually were. Dean wondered for a moment if there is something wrong with his face or if it was his stubbornness? He shook his head; it doesn't matter. The only thing that mattered at the moment was getting out of the hospital and finding his brother, and ganking the son of a bitch that had separated the two of them.


	7. Chapter 7

Sam opened his eyes. Or at least he thought he had opened his eyes, but he still couldn't see. He tried to move his hand to see if he could see it move, only to find he couldn't. He jerked it harder and found his arms, both of them, secured to something. He used his other hand to feel his hand and found that there were cuffs on his hands and a chain leading to the wall. He was chained to a wall! That was so not good. He jerked forward, testing the strength of the chain a few times but it wasn't going to be giving in any time soon.

"Dean!" Sam yelled, looking around the room trying to see if Dean was with him in the room. "Dean!" he yelled again louder, with still no response. He forced himself to calm down, as panicking wouldn't help anything. He looked around the room slower and more thoroughly, trying to see if his eyes would adjust and he could see something. After several minutes all he could see were vague outlines. He jerked harshly on his chains a few times in frustration, but all that gave him were sore wrists. Where was Dean? Was he in the same room but unconscious? Was he in a different room? Why wasn't he calling for him as well? What if he was hurt? What if he was dead? No, Dean couldn't be dead; he refused to think about that.

What had taken him? Where was he? Sam tried to move his hand downward to grab at the knife he had kept in his ankle holster, only to realize his hands were also cuffed to each other, only leaving an inch between them and they were chained behind his back, and he couldn't even see his shoes in front of him in the dark. All of this amounted to absolutely nothing good. Despite that Sam was pretty sure it would only give him sore wrist found himself struggling trying to get the chains off for a minutes before he gave up again.

Maybe it hadn't gotten Dean. Dean had always been the stronger of the two of them and Sam was much more likely to get captured than Dean was. So maybe he couldn't hear Dean because Dean had managed to escape? If that was true then all he had to was wait for Dean to come to him and rescue him. Sam made a face. How was it that it was always Dean rescuing him? He shook his head, it didn't matter, all that mattered was that maybe Dean was out there and if so Dean would get him out here. Sam was filled with hope for all of five seconds before the dread came back. He was apparently still in the same town they had been in, either that or Lucifer really was causing all of this and it would stay with him wherever he went. That was what Sam had told himself. That was what made sense. Sam closed his eyes and lamented that it didn't really make a difference on whether or not his eyes were opened or closed, he could see just as well.

However while his eyes were closed he did see something.

Dean, about twelve years old, was standing in front of Sam, looking at him worriedly.

Sam opened his eyes and shook his head. Weird, that was a strange image. He stared at the distance directly in front of him without blinking hoping to let his eyes get adjusted to the dark even though it hadn't really worked last time. He blinked and twelve-year old Dean was back, looking worriedly at him. Sam opened his eyes, and kept them open not even allowing himself to blink.

Had whomever kidnapped him given him something? Some kind of hallucinogen that was making him see weird stuff? Sam didn't feel any different, well he felt cold, but that was probably because he was in a room that was dark and dank, like a basement. However his mind didn't feel impaired in any way. Sam didn't blink this time when his mind saw something that wasn't there. He saw a kid, a little kid, not any older than six or seven and he was looking at Sam. Sam blinked and the kid went away. Sam huffed in frustration; he hated this, Lucifer screwing with his head again but in a new way. He didn't understand this though unless it was Lucifer's intent was to make him frustrated and scared. Actually, it made a little sense. He sighed, he had to wait and hope for Dean to rescue him. While he did so he would just have to deal with weird flashes and an intense feeling of terror, all coming from his least favorite person that wasn't even real as he was in his own head.

His eyes again focused another vision; it was Dean again but instead of looking worried, he looked angry. Sam frowned at Dean's younger self faded into the darkness of the shadowy room. That one felt familiar though, more like it was a memory, but Sam couldn't quite remember exactly what had been behind it. Why had Dean been angry with him? Dean had been angry a lot of times at him like when Sam didn't listen to him, got himself into trouble or got himself hurt. It was usually Dean's first reaction, then it dissolved into hugging or Dean telling him how worried he had been about him.

Still there was something niggling at the back of his mind something that he was forgetting. Something that he didn't want to know. Sam could feel it, he didn't want to know what it was, but the feeling of terror intensified. There was something wrong, something wrong with this town, something wrong with him, there was something wrong if only he could remember what it was? However, at the same time he didn't want to know what it was that was so wrong, so flawed. He shivered as the cold in the basement seemed to intensify. The concrete floor he was sitting on seemed to drop to freezing and then Sam heard something. His eyes darted around in the dark trying to see what was moving and where it was moving to but it was too dark, and that made the whole thing that much more terrifying. He was a hunter, he shouldn't be so scared, he had never been this scared before in a long time and he had no idea why he was so scared.

There were footsteps that sounded like they were descending a pair of old wooden stairs, since he was in a basement that wasn't a difficult leap. The footsteps paused, from what seemed like ten feet away from him. Then after several moments the footsteps slowly continued down the stairs, very slowly; Sam becoming more and more scared the closer the creature crept.

He closed his eyes. He was a hunter. He wasn't a kid. He wasn't afraid of the monsters in his closet. He hunted the monsters down and destroyed them. Why was he so scared? His heart was pounding frantically against his ribs like it wanted to escape away from whatever was coming and the rest of his body wanted to go with it, but he still didn't understand.

The footsteps stopped about a foot or two away from him and Sam jerked the restraints harshly, every instinct in his body screamed at him to run away, to get away. However, chained as he was he couldn't go anywhere and the fear didn't dissipate whatsoever. There was a sudden click and the basement lit up. There was a clown standing in front of him. A very familiar clown, Sam couldn't put his finger on exactly when or where he had ever seen him before. The clown had orange hair that stuck in the way that clown hair tended to do. His eyes were blue and his face paint was white except around the eyes, which were blue, making them larger, and around the mouth which was red. Sam suddenly knew it wasn't Lucifer who was doing this to him, but the clown. The scariest clown he had ever seen. A clown that made all the other clowns seem...he broke off his train of thought as his body was trembling in fear. This was the something that was wrong with the town...he knew it he didn't know how he knew it, but he knew it. This clown was not a good clown, he knew that instinctively.

"Hiya Sam, long time no see," the clown said with a wicked smile on its face and once it spoke, even though it seemed impossible, Sam's fear level increased again.


	8. Chapter 8

This clown it was a bad clown, he knew this but he wasn't sure how he knew.

"What's the matter Sammy? You don't look happy to see me." Sam tried his hardest to calm his heart down, because it beating faster than was healthy, but it didn't seem to be listening to him and just hammered away. He tried to speak but his voice wouldn't come out. He swallowed and licked his lips, but his voice, which was supposed to come out tough, came out a lot higher pitched than he would have liked.

"Who are you?" he asked. The clown looked at him for a long moment, then shook his head and made a tsking noise.

"You're telling me you don't remember all the fun times we've had together? I know it was a while ago but I remember and I'm a little hurt that you don't," the clown said not losing its wicked grin for a moment. Sam closed his eyes as a memory crashed through his mind. A memory of the same clown and the same fear. He frowned, he didn't know this clown, he had never seen him before, but at the same time he knew that he was wrong. Sam knew this clown, knew that this clown was the reason for his fear of all clowns, even if at the moment he couldn't remember why.

"Do you know how long I had to wait for you?" the clown asked and Sam didn't say anything because he didn't know. He didn't even know how he knew the clown, but he knew that he did, that and he was still terrified.

" _Sam, what the matter?"_ Twelve-year old Dean's voice asked in Sam's mind. Sam closed his eyes and kept them closed, he didn't want to look at the clown.

" _Dean, I'm scared," his significantly younger voice replied in his head._ Part of him wanted to just put the blame on Lucifer, but he knew it was real and non-Lucifer related. He had a feeling that if he had the choice at the moment he'd prefer Lucifer. Part of him was fighting against the memories because he could feel the memories weren't something he wanted to remember, but the rest of his mind didn't seem to be listening and was bringing them up anyways.

 _"He's my friend" his own younger voice said and he could hear the heart break in his own younger voice_. The clown had done something, something very bad but he didn't know what it was. Sam opened his eyes and glared at the clown anyways because something in him knew that the clown deserved his contempt. The clown's grin widened a bit more.

"So you do remember me, at least a little." the clown said with glee and clapped his hands. Sam wasn't sure what happened but he knew that the clown had hurt someone, someone that he cared about, so he kept glaring even as his heart still raced with fear.

"Well that just makes feel all sorts of warm and fuzzy inside." the clown said and walked closer to him. Sam tried his hardest to not let the Clown touch him because for some reason his instincts, some buried memory inside of him told him to, nothing that he's consciously aware of. The Clown's hand touched him and Sam jerked and his nerves screamed in pain as he felt and saw white light coming out of him.

 _Another flash of the same light leaving him_ then he's back and the light is still leaving him making him feel weaker. The clown lets go and stands up.

"Don't worry, Sam I'm going to kill you but...well I don't know if you remember, but I can't take it all in at once." he scowled for the first time "If I could I would have been freed the first time around." something about that brought another memory up.

_He was at the mall with Dean and he was sticking close to his older brother, but not holding his hand because Dean said holding hands was for sissies. But if he wandered away he was going to get hurt, so Sam did his best not to go too far away from his brother even though Dean's legs were longer than his and he was much quicker. Sam did his best, but he had gotten distracted just for a moment looking at some cool toys in the toys store display and the moment he looked for Dean again he couldn't find him. He looked up and down the hallway of stores panic slowly making his way into his system. He couldn't find Dean, he was lost, he was lost, he couldn't see Dean! He kept on looking around but his feet seemed to be frozen to the spot. He jumped when an unexpected and unfamiliar voice spoke to him._

_"Will you help me little boy?" Sam looked around for Dean then shook his head remembering what his brother and father had told him about talking to strangers._

_"Are you sure? You see I need something and I-" Sam tried to shrink into himself he didn't get a good vibe off the clown, regardless of the fact that he looked friendly enough, it left his stomach with a queasy feeling. Sam's face flooded with relief as he saw Dean made his way towards him. He grabbed Sam arm and pulled him away._

_"Sam, what have I told you about sticking close to me?!" Dean yelled._

Sam blinked, if his memory was right and that wasn't something he had made up or Lucifer had put into his head-which he didn't think was the case- then he had met this clown in the mall, and even then he hadn't liked him. From the whole sucking energy thing from him he knew that the clown was obviously not a normal human, but that didn't mean that he had any idea what the clown was or how to stop it, or even how to get over the intense fear he had of the clown.

"It's been 2 and a half decades Sam, you have no idea the lengths I went through to get you back to me. How many people I had to kill, hoping it would finally be you who came to fix it. " Sam knew then that the ghost he had taken down, that hadn't been what was doing the killings, it was the thing in front of him, and seemed to have killed them just to get his attention. "I had to act like a different ghost every time and leave every hunter thinking that they killed me." Sam sunk a little more, people that he had killed, "All you had to do was stay here for a one more day and then everything would have been fine."

_"We're leaving." A grin split Sam's face normally he hated to leave anywhere but he would be happy if he never set foot in this place again._

The clown grinned again "Every hunter except for one." Sam raised his head again.

"That's right...there was a hunter he saw the pattern and he knew there was something... unusual going on...so he stayed. I couldn't have him figuring out what I was so I killed him and made the hunters that came to avenge him think that a ghost did. You know that I can take many different shapes." he said with pride. "How's the shoulder by the way?" he asked. Sam this time managed to sound less like a girl, even though he was still scared. He had a little bit more of an idea why he was scared now, but he didn't have the full picture just yet. He had a feeling though that he was going to learn it and he wasn't going to like what he learned.

"It's great." he told the clown snarkily.

"Some fire back in the Winchester. I'm curious Sam, exactly what do you remember?" The clown said leaning slightly towards him. Sam didn't answer him, he didn't want to admit that he remembered very little and was scared that he probably was going to remember.

"That's okay Sam, I'm a patient being. Now that I have you again you're never going to leave."


	9. Chapter 9

After the creature had told Sam that he wasn't going anywhere the clown had made his way out of the basement. The fear was slightly less intense when they weren't it the same room and while his heart hadn't returned to his normal rate Sam no longer felt like he was having a heart attack. He wanted to know what the creature was so he could think of a way to stop it, but at the same time he knew that he was repressing the memories for a reason. As bad as his life was he had never repressed anything before...well that he knew of, so it would have to be pretty bad. Then again he had been a kid kids were a bit more sensitive to things... so maybe it wasn't as bad as he thought it was? He closed his eyes as another memory made its way to the forefront of his mind:

_Another new school, another new town; he thought as he stood in front of another new class, not a single familiar face in the crowd of people. Maybe this town would be different. His teacher was a nice-looking young woman in her mid-to late 20's; she had short brown hair and was wearing a sweater and khakis._

_"Hello class, we have a new student today. Why don't you introduce yourself to everyone?" Sam nodded, even at nine-years old he was well-versed in this kind of thing._

_"Hi, my name is Sam Winchester and my family moved here from Toledo." It was all the teachers usually expected him to say up front and if they wanted more then they would ask. It seemed like enough for his teacher because she said._

_"Everybody say 'hi Sam'," they all said it back most of them less than enthusiastic. "Sam why don't you sit next to Peter?" she said pointing to an empty seat next to a small boy with black hair and pale skin. Sam nodded and made his way over and sat down._

Sam blinked, okay that memory was obviously of his first day of school in this town, there was nothing odd about it or anything really that helped him at all with the situation he currently found himself in. But he supposed that he hadn't just blocked out the scary ones but all memories of this place. It only took a few minutes before another memory bubbled the surface:

_Peter was sitting by himself outside on the playground, was looking at the other children. Sam made his way closer to Peter and sat down next to him and Peter looked away._

_"Hi Peter, I'm Sam."Sam said and Peter said a soft, nervous._

_"Hi." but didn't look his way._

Sam blinked as the memory stopped there, he shook his head he had no idea what that meant. Were they friends? Guilt, he felt guilty about something, although he had no idea why. He sighed, he supposed that as his memories came back one by one he'd be more and more aware of what ever his mind was trying to repress. Honestly he hoped that Dean would come and save him before then.

~.~

Dean had a new set of clothes on: scrubs since the clothes he had been brought in with were covered in blood. He had liked that shirt too. Whatever had taken Sam was going to pay for that as well. He was checked out AMA after having to spend what seemed like forever with the doctor trying to convince him not to check out and when he realized he couldn't change Dean's mind he gave him a set of instructions to follow. He had no intention of following any of them though until he found Sam.

He had no car since the car he had driven last was apparently totaled. He was glad that it hadn't been the Impala. Due to his lack of car he walked, albeit a little weakly and the headache he had was getting worse since he had no longer was taking any medication for it other than normal aspirin. It was a good thing the town was small and that the town had a hospital in the first place.

It took him several minutes to get back to the hotel room and saw with one single glance around the room Sam hadn't been back there. He quickly changed out of his scrubs and into jeans and another shirt to draw less attention to himself. Dean looked around the room once more hoping he missed any sign on Sam coming back to the room but he hadn't.

Dean took out all his back up phones since his phone had been broken in the car and checked all of them for any messages, only to find none.

Dean grunted in frustration, he had no idea where Sam was and no idea how to find him. Worst of all he couldn't seem to help but feel that something was terribly wrong. He had to find Sam, he had to protect him, it was his job. No matter what they had said in the past, it was his first thought in any given situation: protect Sammy. It had been drilled into his head from the time he was a kid: protect Sammy. It was the only thing on his mind, but he had no idea how to protect Sammy, he had no idea how to even find him. There was only one thing he could even think about doing which was looking for Sam around town.

Hours later and he had searched nearly everywhere in the small town. He hadn't really expected to find Sam just sitting in a bar with a beer bottle in his hand and a drunk smile on his face when he was supposed to be at the hospital, but to find nothing, no clue about where Sam was that was really frustrating. The only good news was his headache seemed to be easing off a bit. He looked up at the door of the motel room that he had made his way back to hoping Sam would just walk in the door telling him it was all some elaborate joke. Dean would hug him right after he killed him or at least that how he pictured it in his head since it did not happen in reality.

He looked back down at the phones a moment later. He had set the phones in a row all of them staring face up at him. Not a single missed call or message on any of them. The feeling that something was terribly wrong only intensified in the last few hours and he had grabbed the phones and manually checked several times to make sure that they were working. He needed to find Sam he knew that, he just wasn't sure how. He really needed to lojack his brother that way he would be a lot easier to find. A smile momentarily twitched on his lips before leaving again. Dean started nervously drumming his fingers on the cheap motel table as he looked down at the phones.

Something was bugging him, something was off but he couldn't seem to figure out what it was. Something about the case, on the surface everything seemed fine about. Ghosts kill people, they salt and burn the bones and it stops killing people. That was the normal hunting cycle and that how it seemed like everything had gone. But something seemed off some how. What it was he wasn't sure but something was off about this whole thing, other than the fact that his brother was missing.

There was something about the accident too. He kept replaying it the car coming at him there had been something off about the way the car had come after them, but he couldn't seem to put his finger on what that was either. He had only seen it for a second before the two cars had collided but there was something there, something important. He remembered the sounds of the two cars colliding and seeing a flash of silver and then the pain, but no it was something else. Dean shook his head, he had to focus, Sam's life could be on the line, and his remembering or not remembering could be the thing that could save his brother. It was just a second where he had seen the windshield of the silver car right before it had smashed into them. Dean shook his head he knew there was something there, and it seemed obvious he just wasn't seeming to get it. He wished Sam was there, he'd probably know, of course if Sam was there then he wouldn't be trying to find him. Also it probably wouldn't help much anyways since it had smashed into his side of the car.

Dean closed his eyes and focused he was looking at the road in front of him when he had just for a second out of the corner of his eyes saw the flash of silver, he had turned his face just as the silver car rammed into their borrowed car. He rewound it mentally and played it again the flash of silver the glance into the car and this time he finally realized what it had been that he had been trying to figure out.

There hadn't been anyone in the driver's seat. He replayed that moment in his mind again and found that he remembered it exactly the same way. There hadn't been anyone in the driver's seat. His headlights had flashed directly into the car for a split second and there had been no driver. Their car had been rammed by a ghost. Sam had been kidnapped by a ghost.

Dean frowned, but they had taken care of the ghost, besides the fact that it didn't haunt that road anyways; no one had died on that road. He got on Sam's laptop and looked up the road they had been on to make sure: no deaths. The spirit might have switched roads; only they were supposed to have salt and burned it. They must have gotten it wrong, there must have been another ghost or creature, either that or they were dealing with two monsters

* * *


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't own Supernatural

Sam's stomach was starting to grumble. He had been down here overnight and the clown hadn't given him anything to eat yet. It wasn't terribly serious, he could wait longer without too much discomfort, but it was a little unpleasant. He looked around the dark room, apparently it had no windows or else some light would be able to come through, unless they were boarded up. It seemed more likely from the startling lack of light that there were no windows. What kind of place had no windows? He was trying to keep his mind busy while he waited for Dean to save him; of course his mind was busy, it kept bringing up old buried and forgotten memories although nothing that would explain anything. All he had was a few snippets. How he had met the clown, his first day of school here, and trying to talk to a kid named Peter, none of which were very helpful in trying to figure out what the clown was and try to take it down. Sam winced as another memory made its way to the forefront of his mind:

_"Dean, I'm scared." They were in a room with two beds, but it was obviously not a motel since the comforters weren't identical and there was only one door leading off from the room. Sam was terrified. Dean sighed and tried to say calmly, though Sam could see that it was 1:00 in the morning from the alarm clock on a table between the two beds, so he had to have been keeping Dean up for a while._

_"Of what? I checked the closet; I checked under the bed, I checked the floors. The windows are lined with salt nothing can come in here." No, not nothing, he thought._

However before he got more into it the memory ended. Sam knew that fear he had felt had to do with the clown. What had the clown done that was so bad that he was so scared of him? That his mind had repressed all the memories? If the clown had gone after him why hadn't he told Dean or his Dad? Before he was able to think any further about it he was thrown into another memory:

_"Hello Sam." Sam was at a playground swinging on the swing set, not going very high, just kind of rocking back and forth, the toes of his shoes digging grooves into the sand as he dragged them along the ground. He looked over to see who had spoken, only to see the same clown that he had seen at the mall. The clown sat down on the swing right beside him. Sam stuck his feet into the ground, stopping himself, then ran across the park to Dean who was sitting on a park bench, panicked. Dean saw him coming and saw the frightened look on his face so he stood up and met him halfway._

_"What's wrong Sammy?" he asked, Sam pointed at the swing, and Dean looked at the swing, confused._

_"I don't get it? What's wrong Sammy?" he looked over at the swing again to the smiling clown who waved to him. He looked at Dean and saw that he looked over right at the clown but still looked confused. The clown was suddenly right by him and Sam jumped._

_"Sam, I don't get it." Dean said confused and a little irritated._

_"He can't see me." the clown said then put his hand on Dean's stomach, the older boy responding by bringing both hands to his belly. It was obvious that he was in pain, little wisps of white light were escaping him, it only lasted for a few seconds though then the clown let him go._

_"You tell Dean or anyone else about me, I'll hurt him again." the clown said and Sam's lip trembled._

Sam's eyes snapped open, that clown had hurt Dean, that's why he hadn't told anyone about the clown. Somehow even back then it knew like every enemy seemed to that he and Dean were each other biggest weakness, and would do anything to stop the other one from being hurt. He hated the clown the same way he hated anyone who caused his brother pain, even if his brother probably hadn't known at the time and probably thought it was just a stomach ache, but the fear didn't dissipate in the slightest. The clown must have really done some bad things if he feared him this much, but that was something he had already figured out.

_"Please don't leave me."_

_"Sam, you're too small and young to go with us, besides you'll be safer in the car." Dean insisted softly, normally Sam would believe him but Dean didn't know about the clown._

_"Please don't' leave me alone." Sam pleaded. The clown was going to come; he always came when he was separated from his family. The clown also came when they were together, but it was worse when they weren't together because then he couldn't even seek comfort in them._

_"Sam, we'll be quick, we'll be back in a jiffy." Dean said rubbing his shoulder trying to calm him down._

Sam blinked and the memory was over; he swallowed hard. He was pretty sure why he was so scared of the clown now. He had a feeling what he had felt that the clown was a lot like Lucifer, always around; only he was the only one who could see him. Except unlike Lucifer who could only bother him because he wasn't real, the clown was and could hurt others that he cared about. Which wasn't even to mention that fact that while this was happening he was nine years old and children tended to experience a more heightened sense of fear than adults did. He knew even more that then he had before that the memories that were to come were not going to be pleasant ones and he willed Dean to save him before they came.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please let me know what you think :)


	11. Chapter 11

The memories were coming faster now, leaving less and less space between them. At this rate he'd know everything in a couple of hours. It seemed inevitable, but Sam hoped that with the knowledge he would gain in addition to the terror and guilt he was sure to feel, hopefully at least he'd be able to figure out how to destroy the creature.

_"Sam, what's the matter?" They were in their bedroom again and Sam was sitting on his bed, he shifted his gaze so that he was no longer looking at Dean but at the floor._

_"Nothing." he lied._

_"Sam, you're a bad liar. What's the matter?" Sam wanted to tell him, but the Clown said if he told him Dean would be next and he didn't want anything to happen to Dean. It made him want to cry. He hated this town, he wanted to get out of here, but he couldn't ask because if he did Dean would get hurt._

Sam thought about the memory. Apparently his fear had escalated from Dean being hurt to Dean being next, whatever next meant, he had a feeling it wasn't good. Not to mention he felt the emotions like it had just happened. His younger self had been so scared and hadn't been able to tell anyone. Sam was used even at that age to keeping secrets, but there was two people; well really one that he had never had to keep a secret from at that age: Dean. Granted he hadn't always told him everything, but he had been able to tell him everything if he so chose.

_"Dean," Sam said aloud, even though he knew that his brother wasn't there. If he had to guess he would guess that he was still feeling his younger self's emotions a bit. All his younger self had wanted at the moment in his memory was to be hugged by Dean, but hadn't been able to because hugging meant that something was seriously wrong. He hadn't been able to tell Dean, because if he had told Dean then Dean would have been hurt._

_"Dean, where are you?" Sam whispered which was exactly when a separate memory started._

_Sam was lying in bed with his eyes closed. But he wasn't sleeping; he was trembling with fear. He wished that he could wake Dean up. Dean would make him feel better but he couldn't let his brother know something was wrong._   
_Sam's eyes were closed on purpose because he was there; standing right over Sam's bed. He could feel the clown's eyes on him and he hated it._

_"Please just go away," Sam whispered quietly so that Dean wouldn't wake up and get hurt._

_"I will Sam, I just need something from you first."_

_"What do you want?" Sam would give him almost anything if he just went away and stopped bothering him and making him scared._

_"I'll let you know," the clown said, but didn't say anything else or leave. Sam found himself crying and had to stuff his face into his pillow so that he wouldn't make a sound. If he woke Dean up his brother would get hurt and he couldn't allow that to happen._

Sam jerked back into the present. He hated that clown; he hated and feared it so much. He hadn't felt the hate before in the memories, just the fear but he did now. Sam was no longer a kid and was able to see it in a way he hadn't been able to when he was a kid. The clown had used his protectiveness of Dean to keep him from saying anything. He wanted that clown dead, but before he could get too much more into that thought he was whisked away into another memory.

_The kid, Peter, was smiling at him and he felt happy too. The two of them were outside playing tetherball. Sam hit the ball one way and Peter tried unsuccessfully to hit it back to him, but he didn't seem at all discouraged and his smile didn't slip away._

_Peter wasn't exactly a popular kid. He wasn't ugly or fat, but he was very shy and he tended to isolate himself. Sam didn't know why but he had a bad feeling about it. Which was why he had gone out of his way to make friends with Peter, and it made Sam happy to see the other boy happy. The next time around Peter managed to hit it but the movement pulled his sleeve up and Sam caught sight of something on his arm. Bruises, like the ones his Dad and brother got when they went hunting, which often came along with blood. He got bruises sometimes too when he was sparring with Dean. He had to learn how to fight because eventually he would be expected to go hunting as well; he was just too young at the moment. Why did Peter have bruises? Was he a hunter? He noticed that Peter was about to win the round so he hit the ball back and it started to untwist again, then for the moment he forgot about the bruises._

Sam winced, because while he apparently at least yet in his memories hadn't seen the signs, he did now. He felt like he was close to Peter even if he only had a few memories of him at the moment. He had a suspicion that Peter had been abused and a bad feeling about him, although he couldn't figure out anything more than his sense of unease about the boy.

_"Want to play after school?" Sam asked, Peter smiled for a moment, and then looked down at the ground, his smile strangely gone._

_"Can we go to your house?" Peter asked. Sam frowned; he wasn't really allowed to have friends over. Most of the time they had guns and stuff that made people nervous and as Dean liked to say 'Call CPS on their asses.'_

_"We can't play at yours?" he asked, disappointed. Peter was a really nice, and cool and he would like to spend more time with him, but he couldn't, not at Sam's place. If they couldn't go to Peter's then he wasn't sure that they could play._

Sam came back to himself even more certain that Peter had been abused and even more positive that he and Peter had been growing close. He wondered what had happened to Peter. Was he still around this town? If Sam was alive when Dean got him out of there he could go visit Peter and-sometimes felt wrong about the scenario, but he couldn't his finger exactly on what it was. Maybe Dean would know. When Dean came, because he was going to he had to believe that, Sam would ask him what he knew about a boy named Peter if he didn't remember himself by then.


	12. Chapter 12

He heard steps on the stairs again and the fear came back, but at least this time it was mixed with anger. Anger was easier to deal with than fear, and as long as he didn't let it take him completely over it made him sharper. The footsteps made their way to the bottom of the stairs and the light was flicked on. The clown was standing there with a large grin on its face; boy, Sam hated the clown. The clown was holding a plate with a sandwich sitting on it.

"I thought you might be hungry." Sam was, but he didn't want anything from the clown, so he shook his head and said,

"I'm fine." His stomach of course chose that moment to growl and the clown somehow smiled even wider.

"Your stomach doesn't seem to agree," he said, looking pointedly at Sam's stomach. He put the sandwich down by Sam and then stepped away a few feet.

"So how much do you remember now?" he said conversationally, "I assume something juicy from the glares you're shooting at me."

"You hurt Dean," it was the biggest thing, but that was only probably because Sam only had small snippets of memory at the moment.

"That I did," the clown said still grinning. "Is that all you remember?" he said, indicating there was more.

"You scared me almost all the time." The clown nodded.

"That I did. Is that all I did?" it was all Sam could remember, but it was enough for him even though he had a feeling that there was more much more. Sam stayed silent and just glared at the clown.

"So you still have a few holes in your memory. I have a few questions myself, curious as I am. Did someone in your family put a spell on you to forget what happened here or did you repress the memories yourself?" Sam was pretty sure he had repressed them, but he wasn't telling the clown that.

"Not feeling in a sharing mood Sam?" the clown said it's smiled dimmed before he made his way over to Sam again and put his hand on his shoulder. Pain coursed through the hunter, but only a few moments before the clown took his hand away, looking happy again.

"You are so tasty. It's why I chose you in the first place. You glowed so bright. Which is why I came to you but you left before I could finish," the clown shook his head, "So many people had to die just so I could get you back here, because it had to be you Sam. Because I chose you, I couldn't choose anyone else. You want to know how I came to be in this  _Podunk_  town?" he said the word Podunk like it was vile. Sam didn't say anything, but that didn't stop the creature from continuing it's monologue, which he let it do in case it gave any clues to what kind of creature it was.

"There was a man named Jerry Sullivan. He wanted power so he called on me, fortunately he botched the binding ritual." the Clown frowned. "Unfortunately he didn't botch it completely, he left me tied to the town. And then you came." He smiled again,

"You had such light, such power and you didn't even know it," he sighed "I knew I shouldn't have picked you, you were transient. But I really thought I could complete it before you left. I was wrong though, but it's okay because tonight at midnight I will complete this and escape." The clown paused, "I really hope that you remember by then. Or else I might have to make a spell to help you remember. I would hate for you to die without remembering me fully." The clown said the smile in place again.

"I'm sure that it would really cut you up inside." Sam countered sarcastically. The smile faded away.

"Do you remember your friend Peter?" the clown asked, again the bad feeling about Peter returned. The clown must have seen it on his face because he smiled again. "Do you remember what happened to him?" Sam didn't, but he had a bad feeling.

_They had come up with a plan. It wasn't ideal because they weren't allowed to talk or laugh too loud, but it was the only place they could play. The library. Peter and Sam were sitting at one of the little tables and quietly whispering to each other about nothing important when Sam stopped because he saw the clown again. It was standing right in front of him staring at him, Sam looked away and pretended like he couldn't see it, because no one else but him could and he didn't want Peter to think he was crazy. Maybe he was crazy? Except that the monster had actually hurt Dean and he didn't imagine that. The clown grinned its terrifying grin at him and Sam wanted to cry. He wanted the clown to go away, and stop staring and saying mean things to him. But he couldn't even tell the clown to go away, because Peter was there and Peter was his only friend in town. Well, besides Dean, but Dean was always his friend and sometimes even he was mean to him._

_"Sam." the clown said and Sam did his best not to pay attention to him and focus on what Peter was saying. But he couldn't hear the words, well he could but it all sounded like 'blah blah blah' to him. He tried to focus on the words his friend was saying but the fear and the gaze of the clown made it very hard to focus._

_Then they were in the same location but on a different day. He could tell because Peter was wearing something different than he had in the last memory. He also had a bruise on his eye. His younger self hadn't put the pieces together though when Peter had told him that he had walked into a doorknob, Sam had believed him. He had just thought his friend was clumsy but nice._

_They were doing homework together. Sam kept looking at the clock because his Dad was going to pick him up in twenty minutes and he had to be waiting outside in fifteen. If he weren't then his Dad wouldn't let him come to the library again. He looked at Peter who was looking sad, well sadder than usual. His friend always seemed a least a little bit sad, and he looked paler. He had already asked Peter if he was sick but he had claimed he wasn't. He had a vague feeling in the back of his mind that he was missing something, but mostly he was just occupied by the clock and his math homework._

Another flash! _He had his arms circled around his chest as he tried his hardest to keep his breathing calm, to stop himself from waking up Dean. If Dean woke up he would want to know what was wrong and Sam wanted to tell him so bad. But he had been warned if he told then Dean or someone else he cared about would be hurt. He couldn't tell anyone no matter how much he wanted to._

Another flash.

_He was all alone. His Dad was out trying to get some money and Dean was doing his homework in the main room. That was when the clown decided to show up._

_"Hello Sam." He was back again. Sam's arms immediately went around his legs as he could protect himself from the clown that seemed determined to make his life miserable._

_"What do you want?"_

_"You burn so bright," the clown said almost reverently looking at Sam like he was a precious jewel._

_"Go away." Sam voice trembled as he said it, but the clown looked as if he hadn't spoke._

_"I need something from you...it's a shame that I can't take it all at once, rituals and all that." the clown said and started walking closer to Sam who buried his head into his knees not wanted to look the terrifying creature in the eyes. "I do have to say that it's going to be painful, but you're not going to scream are you?" the clown stated it wasn't a question so much as it was a threat. Sam felt tears coming into his eyes, but shook his head he knew what the punishment was for telling and he wouldn't let the clown hurt his family._

Another flash

_He and Peter were at school at what appeared to be lunch. They were sitting on round little seats in what looked to be a cafeteria. Peter looked paler than he had in the last memory. Sam was even more worried about his friend and he wished there was something he could do for his friend, but he couldn't think of anything to do. The clown showed up, but this time Sam wasn't the only one who visibly winced. Sam looked to Peter and followed his line of sight, he looked like he was looking at his clown, frowning because as far as he knew Sam was the only one who could see him._

_"Peter, can you see him?" Sam asked in a soft whisper. Peter immediately turned to him._

_"Can you see him?" Peter asked shocked, although he looked a little bit relieved, Sam felt the same way. Two months of being the only one that had seen him and been terrified by him, and he finally had someone who could see him too and who could share in his terror._

_"How long?" Sam asked wondering if Peter had been hiding it this whole time. Could he have been sharing his terror with Peter all this time?_

_"A week." Peter said. Sam face fell, he was disappointed. Disappointed that he was still alone in how long he had been suffering. Except that he didn't want Peter to suffer like he had. He didn't wish his fate on anyone else, least of all his good friend Peter. That was of course when the clown interrupted. The clown didn't talk that often mostly just to terrify him._

_"Tonight is the last time." Sam was hopeful. Did that mean that the clown was going to stop hurting him? Stop terrifying him? "For one of you." he said then looked between the two of them. Sam felt bad that he wanted it to be him, then again Peter had only had to deal with the clown for a week and he had had to deal with him for the past two months. The clown went away._

Another flash

_Sam was sitting at his normal desk staring at the desk next to him fearfully. Peter wasn't at his desk like he usually was and he was worried about his friend. He could hardly focus on what the teacher was saying because he had a bad feeling. The clown's words came back to haunt him._

_"Tonight is the last time, for one of you." He was worried throughout all of the morning and at lunch he could hardly eat because of how worried he was about his friend. After lunch he went outside for recess with the others, but didn't play, the feeling making it impossible to enjoy himself. He sat instead on a high wall and looked out at all the other kids having fun and wished that he could be like them. That was when of course the clown showed up sitting right next to him on the wall. Sam trembled, but didn't say anything. He was afraid to know, afraid that his bad feeling was right. However after a couple minutes of the two of them sitting in silence Sam had to know._

_"Did you hurt Peter?" he whispered under his breath not wanting to break the rules._

_"It had to be done," the clown said dismissively and Sam's heart sunk. The clown had hurt his friend._

_"He's my friend," Sam said sadly. The clown looked at him after that statement._

_"He was your friend," The clown corrected and Sam felt even worse because even at nine he knew what the clown was saying._

Sam blinked suddenly out of his memories he looked at the clown accusingly.

"You killed Peter, didn't you?" Hatred blazed his heart even more then it had a moment ago. He could feel how much he had cared about Peter, how much he had enjoyed being with him and his utter sadness at his loss. The clown simply grinned.

"So you do remember what happened to your friend. Do you remember why?" The clown asked. Sam didn't say anything he was pretty sure that he didn't want to remember anything more, however his mind had apparently stopped trying to repress the memories and was spitting them out rapidly, albeit it in a mess.

_He was crying, he tried to stop, he honestly did but it was like his eyes were faucets and he couldn't turn them back off. He didn't even notice that the clown had left, he just hid his face against his legs. It was his fault, all his fault, if it wasn't for him than Peter would still be alive._

Another Flash

_Dean looked angrily at him and Sam shrunk down even more into couch. He didn't look his brother in the eye. Dean was so mad at him, and Sam was barely able to keep himself from crying like the big baby he was, he had been crying all afternoon, which was what got him into this mess._

_"Sam, are you serious? Do you know the story I had to weave to explain why Dad couldn't come pick you up?!"Sam hid his eyes, ashamed. Their Dad was on a hunt and he had made Dean lie for him._

_"I'm sorry, Dean."_

_"Why were you crying?"_

_"It's that movie isn't it?" Dean asked and Sam honestly couldn't remember what movie he was talking about at first, then he remembered the Nightmare before Christmas. Before all this started he had thought it was scary and he had slept with Dean that night so he wouldn't have nightmares. He had learned his lesson though and he didn't want the next person the clown took to be Dean so he lied._

_"Yeah." he said softly and looked down at the ground. He hoped he looked embarrassed and not like he was trying to lie, since he had never really been good at it. "I was worried about Dad too," he said which was true; he was worried about their dad. Their dad was supposed to have been home yesterday, but he wasn't, something bad could have happened to him. Dean sighed but seemed a little more sympathetic, he sat down next to him and said with an encouraging smile,_

_"Dad's going to be fine, he's Dad. Like I said he's a super hero, no one can get him." Sam tried to smile, but he wasn't quite sure that he succeeded. Even if their Dad was okay, that still didn't meant that the clown wasn't going to bother him anymore. No one but him could see the clown well him and Peter, Sam closed his eyes and willed the tears not to come again. It was his fault, it was all his fault._

Sam snapped back to himself and glared at the clown "Why'd you do it? Why'd you kill him?" he asked the clown. Even though he knew that his younger self had felt guilty about it, he still didn't know why that was.

"You don't remember still?" the clown asked smugly. Sam grit his teeth angrily.

"Why don't you just tell me?"

"And why would I do that? It would take all the fun out of you remembering yourself," the clown said. Sam didn't say that he didn't want to remember at least not aloud, but he had the feeling that the clown knew it anyways.

"Why are you a clown anyways?" he asked.

_"Why are you a clown?" he whispered softly, to keep his brother from waking up, because that would be bad very bad._

_"I thought kids liked clowns," the clown replied. Sam shook his head; he had liked clowns before this clown. This clown terrified him more than anything else had before._

Sam snapped back to reality but the clown said nothing just continued to stare at him in that creepy way with that creepy smile just waiting...waiting for him to remember what he didn't want to remember. What his mind had apparently been trying to protect him from, although he had a feeling that that hadn't been a very good decision.

"I chose Peter for a reason. It could have been anyone else in this town but I chose him. Do you remember why?" Sam closed his eyes and could feel the guilt surging in him, but he had no idea why he felt so guilty. Hate surged inside him as well and he looked up at the clown defiantly.

"I hate you," he told the clown because he did hate it for what it had done to Peter and to Dean and the girl. Sam frowned at 'the girl'. The girl. What girl? That thought had come out of nowhere.

_There was a teenage girl's face looking at him from a paper. She was older than him, maybe fourteen or fifteen and she looked happy in the picture. She had dark brown shiny hair and tanned skin, and was wearing a red t-shirt. The most noticeable thing about the paper other than her colored photo was the large word 'MISSING' over the girls head. Sam touched the poster that was taped to the lamp post and read her name: Amy Williams._

_"Sam." Sam eyes and hands darted away from the photo and saw Dean looking at him concerned looking between the flyer and him._

_"Do you know her?" he asked worried, Sam slowly shook his head, but he had a bad feeling about it._

_"You sure?" Dean asked a little suspiciously, Sam shook his head again but this time also replied verbally._

_"I don't know her."_

The scene changed again.

_Sam was tired but he couldn't sleep. He never seemed to be able to sleep anymore, not with clown coming around more and more. He wasn't supposed to have coffee, but he had been having two cups every morning. It was the only way he could stay awake and alert enough to get through school, although he had to sneak it since neither Dad nor Dean would allow it at his age._

_The clown was there again staring at him, but at least he wasn't talking at the moment. Because whenever the clown spoke it was never anything good. Though the worst thing wasn't speaking at all, but he didn't really want to think about that at the moment._

_"I'm getting stronger," the clown said after hours of just staring at him. Sam didn't say anything he just hid his head underneath his blanket like that would stop his voice, but like always it just made the voice louder._

_"That girl hit the spot," he wanted to know who he had hurt, but at the same time didn't want to know._

_"You saw her picture. Tell me, do you find her pretty? I'm not human so I don't see these things the way that humans do." Sam closed his eyes and knew whom he was talking about: Amy Williams. It was his fault that she was hurt and possibly worse than that._

_"She had such a pretty little light, nothing like yours of course Sammy, but she was pretty bright for a human." He had killed her, like he had killed Peter. It was all his fault, he should say something, but if he did then the clown would hurt Dean maybe even make him his next victim and he couldn't let that happen. No matter how guilty he felt about it or the amount of tears that were rolling down his cheeks._

_"Don't worry, Sammy this won't last for much longer." The clown said and Sam peeked his head out of his blanket._

_"Are you going to go away?" he asked scared, but hopeful in barely a whisper since if Dean woke up then that was breaking the rules and Dean would get hurt._

_"Yes, I'm going to leave this town soon."_

_"How soon?" he asked._

_"Well, let's just say it's nearly over." Sam nodded, feeling hope for the first time in ages, he wanted the clown gone. Maybe when it was gone he could tell his Dad and Dean. Then again it wasn't anything in his Dad's Journal, he had looked it over several times while the clown wasn't there to try to find what the creature was because he had hoped he could take it out himself without having to put his family in danger, his family who couldn't even see the creature._

_"Good." Sam whispered under his breath. He couldn't wait for all of this to be over._

"What happens if you kill me?" he was pretty sure he knew, but he wanted the clown to confirm it.

"Why, I get to leave this town of course." he said with his wide creepy grin "I've been bound here for two and a half decades and it's time I broadened my horizons, don't you think?" Sam nodded to himself, he thought so, the being whatever it was going to kill him so that it could leave town and terrorize more people.

"And killing me?" Sam asked, even though he was pretty sure he knew.

"It's the last step. Once you're dead I can go anywhere and do anything I want." Sam nodded again. That was not good, he wasn't even sure what the being was but he was pretty sure if it left the town a lot more people would die. He couldn't let that happen, not when he hadn't stopped it the first time around. The problem was that he had no idea where Dean was and no way of getting out of his binds.

"But I think we're getting sidetracked from my original point, which is why did I kill Peter?" It was his fault. Or at least his nine-year old self had thought so, but he still had no idea why he thought it was his fault.

_He was staring at Dean who was focusing on his homework. It was a rare sight, Dean actually doing his homework. He definitely had the smarts, but he lacked the motivation since Dean didn't see the point in doing well in school since he had already become resigned to the fact that he was going to be a hunter. Dean was biting on the metal of part of his pencil as he looked down at the math problems on the page and Sam just watched him for a long moment._

_He wanted to tell Dean, Dean would take care of it or he'd tell their Dad and he'd take care of it. It would mean he could sleep again and wouldn't have to be afraid all the time. Dean eventually felt Sam's eyes on him and said, sort of irritated,_

_"What?" then again Dean tended to be a little testy when he was doing his homework, since he didn't see the point in doing it. Maybe he could at least figure out what the clown was without actually saying that he could see the creature._

_"I was reading a book and it had this...monster," he decided to call the clown "that could be solid at times and like a ghost at other times, is there any real monsters like that?" he asked. Dean looked at him and shrugged._

_"I don't know. I've never heard anything like that. Why don't you ask Dad?" Sam hopes sunk, he couldn't ask Dad. His Dad would ask more questions and he couldn't have his Dad asking more questions. Sam probably shouldn't have asked the question in the first place. Sam froze for a moment wondering if he had broken the rules with his question, he really hoped not. Dean hadn't noticed though because he had gone back to doing his math._

The scene changed again

_He was sitting on the wall at school again and the clown was sitting next to him again._

_"Do you want to know why I chose Peter out of all the kids in this town?" Sam looked down at the ground sadly._

_"Because you hate me and want me to suffer?" he mumbled and heard the clown's laughter._

_"No, I don't hate you Sammy." Sam shivered he hated when the clown called him that. "In fact I'm very fond of you, but you broke the rules." Sam searched his mind; he didn't break the rules did he?_

_"But I didn't tell anyone." Sam insisted._

_"Think back to two weeks ago and the question you asked your brother." Sam felt a fresh wave of tears threatening to fall._

_"But it was just a question. I said that I read it in a book." Sam insisted._

_"Which was why I didn't take Dean and I took Peter" he said like he had done Sam a favor and he should be grateful, "you really need to be more careful." The clown said and Sam let the tears fall again._

"You killed Peter because I hinted to Dean about you?" Sam said sad, guilty, and angry all rolled into one.

"I did that kid a favor. You know what was happening with Peter, you should be thanking me for sparing Peter a lifetime of that." Sam shook his head. He wasn't going to thank him, not for killing his friend that clown didn't seem to care and just continued on, "Well at least now we seemed to be mostly on the same page, I'm going to leave you for a little bit to think about the past, but I'll be back. The moon is going to be in position soon and then the real fun will begin."


	13. Chapter 13

He heard footsteps on the stairs again and he knew the clown was coming back. In what seemed like no time at all the clown stood in front of him, leering down at him. Sam halfheartedly jerked at the chains but they weren't any looser now than they were before. In fact, he was tearing at his skin when he struggled and there were scabs where the metal met his skin. The slight struggle opened some of those scabs and little streams of blood were trickling from the now open wounds. His butt had long ago gone numb on the cold concrete of the basement but Sam did his best not to let any of his discomfort show on his face as he glared up at the clown who seemed amused by him.

"I know you're not a clown, drop the face." he spat angrily at the creature.

"Not when I know it terrifies you so." he was right. The clown's face was partially why the clown made his skin crawl, now he knew why he had spent so many years being terrified of them.

"It seems like you're remembering more," the clown said as it crouched down in front of him so that their faces were at the same level.

"I remember enough." Sam said shortly fighting the feeling of wanting to scramble away from the clown. He was still scared of the clown but he also wasn't a kid anymore and to move would only injure his arms more. He focused on his anger so that it would overpower his fear or else he was sure that he would be in the midst of a panic attack at the moment. Being face to face with the clown that had terrorized him so knowing what he knew now.

"So do you know what happens next?" the clown asked. Sam nodded, the clown was going to eat his soul like he had with all the others and had already started doing to him, only this time he was going to die. Guilt and worry settled into him again as he thought of what would happen if Dean didn't get there in time.

Dean was right. He always seemed to be right. They should have left when Dean said they should.

"Dean will save me."

"Dean has no idea where you are or what's going on." The clown was right again. Sam had never even told Dean about the clown. How in the world was Dean going to find the clown and know how to take it down in a few hours? However, Sam reasoned, if anyone could do it, it was his brother. Particularly when it came to Dean, there was very little he couldn't do. Whereas he on the other hand he could always be trusted to screw everything up. Dean said they should have left, Sam insisted on staying. They should have left because he had the feeling that this being in front of him was very powerful and the only reason he was still there was because of him.

"I should have let it be." Sam muttered to himself, the clown nodded.

"You should have. Your mind tried to protect you, but it did it in the wrong way, by making you forget. It should have helped you remember but that's good for me." the clown said with it's very creepy smile.

"Dean will find me." Sam said more to himself than the clown.

"Yes he will. But he'll be too late, of course. The good news is once your dead I'll no longer be bound to this town and I can kill some of your Leviathans off." Somehow that didn't comfort Sam much. The clown crouched in front of him so they were at the same eye level.

"Buck up Sam, it will all be over soon. Besides I'm not all bad. I'm the reason the hallucinations in your head hasn't shown up at all while you've been here." Sam had guessed that in a way he was glad he wasn't suffering from both of them at the same time, but still he was in no way thankful to the creature, not after everything he had done.

"Besides it won't be much longer. Two more hours and all your pain, your suffering will be over and my life will begin." Sam glared at him.

"What are you?" he had his suspicions, but it was would be nice to be sure.

"Sammy, Sammy, Sammy." Sam winced at the clown use of his nickname he shook his head like he was disappointed while making tsking noises. "That would be telling," the clown said.

"What happens when you are allowed to leave?" Sam asked. He also had a pretty good idea about that one too, the clowns smile widened.

"Well Sammy, my boy that will be when all the fun starts, and I have so many plans after having been stuck here for so long."

"Like what?" Sam asked warily but still wanted to know.

"Well that would also be telling Sam, and you know how I feel about telling," the clown said and straightened.

"I'll give you the last two hours of your life to ponder that. How does that sound?" the clown said like he was being generous, Sam's only response was to glare at him.

"Sounds great to me too," the clown said and walked back up the stairs leaving Sam alone with his thoughts again.


	14. Chapter 14

Sam rested his head against the hard concrete, taking everything in. He still didn't remember everything but he remembered enough. Peter, poor Peter abused then killed just because he had known Sam. Just like Jess and everyone else who had known the Winchesters, though particularly the youngest member of the family. Sam jerked the bindings again hoping they had a little more give then the last time he had tried, only to find no change. Sam sighed; he was tired, mostly emotionally because of all the grief and guilt he had felt in the last few hours. Where was Dean; was he okay? Was he looking for him? How in the world was Dean going to find him before the time came that the clown was going to kill him and escape this town?

As far as Sam knew Dean didn't know about any of this so how was he going to put it all together in only a couple of hours was a mystery to his younger brother. However, Dean was a great hunter and if anyone was going to be able to figure it out in time and save him it was going to be Dean. Unfortunately even though Sam knew the gist now that didn't stop the previously forgotten memories from coming back.

"Hello Sam," The clown said and stared at in that creepy way of his and Sam hated his stare; it made him so scared.

"Stop looking at me," Sam cried softly, as his brother was in the living room watching TV.

"Why not?" The clown asked. Sam felt the tears coming again.

"Please just stop coming here and looking at me," he pleaded. He would do nearly anything to get rid of the clown. The clown didn't say anything though and just continued watching him. He felt more tears flowing silently down his cheeks.

The scene was the same but the time was different.

He was cold, but he didn't move, he stared at his sleeping brother. Dean was lying on his belly, his head on top of the pillows and his hands underneath it. He was covered in dark green blanket and he looked….peaceful. Sam wanted that, he wanted peace. He wanted to climb in like he had just had a nightmare, but if he did Dean would wonder why and he wasn't sure he could lie convincingly enough. He knew he couldn't stay much longer, he didn't know how but his brother seemed to have a sixth sense when it came to him. If he stayed much longer Dean was going to know that something was wrong and the clown would hurt him and Sam couldn't allow that to happen. So even though he didn't want to he made his way back to his own bed and just contented himself by just looking at Dean. He imagined Dean's arm around him and although it wasn't the same thing as actually having Dean by his side, he was able to forget for long enough to fall asleep.

The Scene changed again

Sam stared at the empty desk that used to hold his friend. Peter wasn't sitting in it. Peter would never sit at that desk again. It was his fault. Peter was gone. Sam buried his head into his arms as he half listened to the teacher go on about a book that they were supposed to have read, but Sam hadn't even opened yet because it was very difficult to read when a clown was staring at you that no one else could see. School seemed pointless. The clown had hurt Dean and really hurt Peter and he didn't know what to do. Everything else just seemed pointless.

"Sam." Sam jumped as the clown appeared right beside him and he sat up his eyes focused on the clown.

"Sam." Sam blinked as he realized it hadn't been the clown that had called his name that time but the teacher. He blinked a few times trying to see if he could remember what the teacher had said, it was probably a question but he didn't remember it, so he just stared.

"Sam, do you know the answer?" the teacher asked. She didn't look irritated; she looked concerned, which was worse. Sam looked down at the desk and shook his head.

"Sam, are you okay?" Sam nodded his head but kept staring at the desk. There was a short pause before his teacher started talking again about the book.

He was at school again, at the playground, exactly where he had been when he had found out about Peter. He stared at all the other kids laughing and having fun, he wished he were like them. Wished he didn't have to deal with all of this, and all without Dean. Part of him wanted to run away, run away and never come back here but he couldn't because the clown would hurt his family. He tucked his legs against his chest and laid his head down on his knees as he tried to block out the sound of all the other kids having fun.

To make matter worse his next memory was in the same place the playground. He and Peter were playing basketball, but on one of the shabbier courts. The hoop lacked a net and was a bit rusted, but he and Peter didn't care. The older boys always took the good courts with more people. Both he and Peter were smiling having a good time as Sam blocked Peter's shot with his arm and rebounded it to half court. Sam took his own shot, which hit the rim, and bounced off of it hitting Peter in the arm, he yelped then covered his mouth. Sam grabbed the ball and made his way over his friend concerned about him.

"Are you okay, Peter?" he asked. Peter nodded vigorously and looked around like he was afraid he was in trouble.

"Let me see," Sam said moving closer to Peter, he was more used to seeing bruises and blood then most kids his age were, but Peter moved away and hid his arm behind his back.

"I'm fine, it just bounced off it." Sam shrugged and passed Peter the ball who caught it and started to take it out again.

~.~

They were now in the living room, their packed duffel bags at their feet, about to get ready to leave this place, leave this town. That of course was when the clown showed up. He looked at them at the bags by their feet and apparently realized what was going on.

"You can't leave," the clown said sticking his hand into Dean's stomach, the boy promptly folding over in pain. Sam's eyes welled up at the sight, but he had a feeling, an instinct that since the clown was dead set against them leaving that was they had to do. Sam grabbed both his and his brother's bag and put them over his shoulder, despite the fact that together the weight was trying to topple him to the floor. With his other hand he pulled his brother's hand.

"Come on we got to get to the car Dad's waiting for us," he pulled insistently on Dean's hand who swatted it away.

"Sam, my stomach's killing me." Sam shook his head.

"We have to get in the car." Dean looked up at that.

"Since when are you Gung Ho about moving?" Dean asked.

"I'm not, I'm just trying to do what Dad told us," he said. He needed something more, something to get Dean into the car "It was an order." he said feeling a little bad about bringing it up, but if he was right the best thing for all of them was to leave the town and never come back. Dean groaned but pulled himself into a standing position. Sam saw the light leaving Dean; he had to get him into the car as soon as possible and away from the clown. He grabbed Dean's hand tightly and pulled him towards the car. Sam opened the passenger's side door for him and even though it was obvious Dean in pain Dean gave him a look that said 'I can still open my own door' but he sat down anyways. Sam closed it and hopped into the back just in time to hear their Dad ask.

"What the hell took you so long?"

"Dad, can we leave now?" Sam asked since the clown was still drawing energy from his brother even though his Clown form was halfway out of the car. His Dad nodded and started the car up. They drove for a while and Sam saw Dean looking more and more pale. If he wasn't right then he was going to be the reason that Dean was dead. He had to tell his Dad, he had no other choice. He opened his mouth to do so when the clown glared at him and detached himself from Dean. Immediately the pained look on Dean's face vanished and he looked much more perky.

Sam opened his eyes for the moment. No more stray memories were filtering about, which was fine with him because he was pretty sure he understood what was going on now. The only question was how was he going to get out of this?


	15. Chapter 15

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: I don't own Supernatural

Sam was better at research and, well, Dean found it to be the boring part of hunting, so it suited him that Sam did research most of the time. That did not mean though that he was incapable of doing research himself. He had everything that he had about the case spread out in front of him and within a few minutes found exactly what Sam had before. It all seemed to lead to the same conclusion that Sam had made. There had to be something he was missing though.

Dean decided to look further back; only the files Sam had printed out didn't go much further, so he was going to have to use Sam's laptop. He always felt strange using Sam's laptop, especially if Sam wasn't around since his brother was a little bit of a control freak and didn't like other people touching his stuff. Dean was pretty sure Sam was in trouble though so he didn't care too much.

He again found the death he had found before, but looking back further he found another possible ghost. This one had a completely different M.O and its last kill was a month before the new batch of deaths the ones that had to the do with the road. This ghost's M.O was killing people in their houses with their doors locked and in some cases their security system set. Dean looked further back and found that that ghost had killed four people before there had been a month long hiatus before their ghost had shown up. It was strange to have two ghosts in such a short time in the same town. Dean looked further back and found yet another ghost, this ghost had killed three people in strange drownings in a river that ran close to the town.

Dean frowned as he realized that there had been three separate ghosts in the town in the last year, something about that was off. Some towns tended to draw spirits to them, but it usually had to do with some mystical properties in the ground or underneath it. As far as he knew Pleasant Grove, Idaho was not one of those towns. There was something nagging at the back of his mind, telling him that there was something wrong about this, something that he wasn't getting and it was staring at him right in the face.

Dean looked again and found ghost after ghost after ghost and the deaths spanned twenty-five years. Dean's brows furrowed further, when he realized in fact the last ghost he found was the ghost that they had moved to Pleasant Grove to hunt. Again something told him that there was something very wrong with this situation. The last ghost in the town had been when they were here before? Except that another few clicks on Sam's laptop told him there had been some other deaths while they had lived here that didn't match up with the ghost's M.O of the one that he and his Dad had been hunting the first time they had come to the town. At that point though he had mostly just researched and watched his father's back when needed. So had their been two ghosts? Except that he looked at the dates and after looking through their father's journal he found that the bodies had been found after they had left town.

Nothing was adding up, even though Dean felt like he should know what was going on. He looked at the deaths again and froze as he realized that they were kids, two girls and a boy. Seriously what kind of twisted freak did that to kids? But that wasn't what caused him to freeze; it was the boy's name. He knew that boy; he had seen him around a few times. Where had he seen him? Dean closed his eyes trying to remember and then it hit him. The kid had been Sam's friend while they were here, the kids had always hung around at the library. Sam's friend was dead. That had to mean something; he just wasn't sure what it meant. Come on brain, work, he said to himself he needed to figure out what was going on so that he could get Sam back. Sam, Sam was gone so maybe whatever it was had taken him for a reason. If only he could figure out what that reason was.

Dean focused back to that time Sam had been distant and little more scared then usual but he had just found out about the supernatural only months ago and Dean had let him watch that stupid movie which had terrified him even further. It had been so long ago that Dean was having a little trouble remembering more than just vaguely. He forced himself to delve further because Sam was in trouble and there was something in this town that had wanted him and it was his duty as a big brother to save Sam.

There was something about the ghosts that was bothering him so he looked back at the notes he had wrote about the ghost there was a month gap between the stopping of one ghost and the start of another that was really odd, it wasn't exactly a month but close enough to give Dean pause. There was something niggling at the back of his mind something important. That was really odd for there to be so many ghosts grouped together and to have a month between the disappearance of one and the sudden appearance of another one. Almost as if...almost as if...Dean flipped through his father notes again and found a note.

 _Meet Joshua in Pleasant Grove, Idaho_  followed by  _Rugaru hunt took longer than expected Caleb took care of the ghost._

Dean closed his eyes and tried to focus on what was wrong with this situation what was going on. Why someone had taken his little brother? He pushed that thought away for now knowing that if he was going to find Sam he had to find out what was going on first. What was wrong with the situation? The month...the month… it had to mean something but what? Dean opened his eyes wide as he had an idea, an awful idea. It was almost like something was luring hunters to the area, but what kind of creature would  _want_ hunters around? Most monsters tried their damnedest to avoid them. Something that wanted a hunter, something that kept luring because it hadn't got the right hunter yet something that had wanted Sam.

That wasn't good and Dean hoped that he was wrong but he didn't feel wrong. Dean suddenly remembered how Sam's eyes used to focus on walls and other objects like he was seeing something else other then what he was seeing he hadn't recognized the look back then but that was back before Lucifer had made himself at home in his brother's head he definitely recognized the look now.

His brother had been scared and he had attributed it to a movie, but Dean considered now that he might have been wrong Sam might have been scared about something completely different. However, it couldn't have been a ghost because the places they lived were always salted six ways to Sunday not that he had thought it was really a ghost now that he thought all the ghost was there to lure Sam back here. But what was it really? What had his brother and what did it want with him? Dean closed his eyes momentarily and he realized it probably hadn't abducted Sam to share a cold one, it probably meant to hurt Sam and Dean couldn't let that happen. However, whatever it was, it had to powerful, pretending to be ghosts and pretended to be killed just to do it over and over again. Not to mention the car the creature- whatever it was- had driven a car into them without showing itself. So to sum up, if Dean was right and honestly he was hoping he wasn't, there was a very powerful creature out there who had his brother who knew where and had spent twenty-five years luring him back here that was so not good.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading please let me know what you think


	16. Chapter 16

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't own Supernatural

"The time draws near," the clown said as he walked down the stairs with a wide grin, "twenty-five years of waiting has finally paid off. It's going to hurt but I guess you remember that?" Sam didn't say anything, but he did remember how painful it had been. The clown squatted down so that their eyes were at the same level and Sam could see the clown's nasty grin even more clearly. "You want to know why it hurts? Because the soul isn't supposed to be used to draw energy from. However, you should know that you won't be going to Heaven or Hell, which for you is probably the best. I eat souls and they stay with me." Sam closed his eyes as he realized what that meant; Peter's soul was still inside of the creature and had been for the last twenty-five years. Apparently the creature had caught onto his train of thought because he said:

"Peter will be glad for an old friend." He hadn't thought it was possible to hate the creature even more than he already did but apparently he was wrong. "You should have come back sooner Sam," the clown said, "All those people who died, all just to bring you back to me. They wouldn't have had to if you had just stayed." Sam shook his head, he hadn't wanted those people to die and he felt guilty about it, but he was pretty sure that the last thing he wanted unleashed on the world was the unbound clown. Sam wished and the same time didn't want to know what time it was, and how much time there was left before the clown started to eat his soul. He wanted Dean to come to save him. It was always what he thought about when he was in situations like these was that Dean coming to his rescue, because he usually did usually right on time.

"I've waited so long for this moment. Twenty-five years stuck here, unable to leave, to be around the same people. The same dumb people who didn't even realize I was killing them and making it look accidental. Humans can be so dumb," the clown said with a shake of it's head. The clown grinned again.

"It's time. The moon is it the right place and I finally get to leave here. Hello world here Am-heh comes." Sam tried to struggle with the chains holding him in place, but it was no use, the chains weren't budging and the clown was getting closer.

The clown put his hand through his chest into his heart and Sam gasped as the pain started. The pain was terrible; he wanted to close his eyes but the bright light escaping from his chest into the clown's hand kept them open. He was going to die here and be stuck forever with Peter inside of the clown. That was not something that he wanted, not something he wanted at all.

He heard the shot before he saw it and he jerked a little as pieces of rock salt hit his chest, creating another sensation of pain in his already over sensitive chest. He turned slightly and saw Dean standing on the stairs looking at him his shotgun pointed at him; apparently Dean was the one who had shot him. He knew though that Dean hadn't been aiming for him, he was aiming for the clown, but apparently the salt had gone through the clown's body. Dean moved a little as he dropped the rock salt gun to the floor and took another gun out of his pocket.

The gun this time was no longer angled towards him, which was good because it went through the clown again and into the wall, it was not full of rock salt. Dean paused for a moment and Sam could see that he was trying to figure out what to do next. Dean then dashed for Sam for...well the only reason Sam can come up with was that he was trying to free him. The clown took his hand out of Sam and stood up just in time to throw Dean hard into the concrete wall.

"No!" Sam screamed as he saw and heard Dean's head make contact with the wall. Dean slid down the wall and didn't move. Sam scrambled up to his knees and moved as far as the chain would allow him, which was only just long enough so that Sam could put his finger on Dean's neck and feel for a pulse. He let out a short sigh of relief as he felt the heart beat beneath his fingers, however he was less relieved when he caught sight of Dean's head, which was bleeding pretty steadily. Unlike his neck, Dean's head was out of Sam's reach, however, his pockets weren't.

Sam opened Dean's jacket quickly trying to find something that would take down the clown, he passed up knives and guns and settled on a stake. He barely managed to pull the stake from his brother's jacket when he felt himself being pulled by the chains and thrown across the room. Sam hadn't had a very good grip on the stake when he was thrown, so he dropped it before his own head made contact with the wall on the opposite side of the room hard.

His head hurt and his chest hurt but unconsciousness didn't come for him, he couldn't decide whether that was a good thing or a bad thing. He decided it was a bad thing when he tried to move to go after the stake, which was ten feet away and found that the slight movement made him want to vomit.

"That was very disruptive," The clown looked down at Dean.

"Maybe since your brother's already here I'll drain him too."

"No, don't, I swear I'll cooperate." Sam begged. There wasn't much he could do anyways and if he tried to move again he'd probably just end up puking on himself. Part of him wished that Dean hadn't found him, because Dean was going to feel guilty about this for probably the rest of his life, which was just how his brother worked.

The clown, after a moment started walking toward him again and Sam grimaced as he tried to move away instinctively and the nausea hit again. The clown's hand was in his chest again and then he couldn't move or think, the pain and the nausea blinding him to everything but the pain of the moment. Sam started screaming due to the pain, but a single word from the clown made it seem like his vocal cords had disappeared. He was going to die here in this basement ten feet from Dean and spend the rest of his unlife trapped inside a clown.

 


	17. Chapter 17

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: I don't own Supernatural.
> 
> Thanks for everyone who is reading this and especially those who comment.

Dean woke up when Sam screamed because it was automatic reaction; Sam cried out in his sleep, Dean woke up so that he could take care of him. How he had done that had varied over the years. When they were kids Sam would come into his bed and Dean would comfort him until he fell asleep. As they got older he was just ask if Sam wanted to talk about it and as Sam got older he wanted to talk about it less and less. But none of that was important at the moment; the only thing that was important was the light coming from his brother and the expression of pain on Sam's face coupled with the fact that his mouth was open in a now silent scream.

He wasn't sure what to do; both rock salt and silver had no effect on the ghost. Normally his go to in this situation would be a machete to cut off the head, but he hadn't brought one and didn't have time to go to the Impala to get one. Besides the fact he was pretty sure it wouldn't do any good. The being could be corporeal whenever it wanted to be and incorporeal whenever it wanted to, but he had to do something. He couldn't just sit on the ground and he watched the clown take whatever it was taking from Sam.

The light looked familiar and Dean realized where he had seen something like it before, when Death had put Sam's soul back. The thing was taking San's soul; he had do something, anything. Dean looked at the environment, quickly trying to find anything that might help him when he saw the stake; it was a good ten feet from Sam and the clown.

Dean was pretty sure that he had brought that stake, only he hadn't used it, he hadn't even taken it out. He looked at Sam who didn't seem to notice anything but the pain. Sam must have taken it, Sam must had access to the weapons on Dean sometime during the time he had been knocked out and had decided on this one, There had to be a reason. Sam must know something he didn't... or it had been the only weapon he could reach. He didn't have time to second-guess Sam or himself. If he didn't attack now he was going to lose his brother, he just had to hope that his brother knew something that he didn't.

Dean looked again at the expression of pain on Sam's face before tearing his eyes away and focusing on the stake. He was up on his feet in moments, he ran towards the stake and as quickly as he could jammed the stake into the creatures back right where it's heart should be. The clown turned around and looked at him for a moment surprised before falling to the ground. As it fell it's hand dislodged itself from inside Sam.

Sam took in a sudden deep breath and looked around him for a moment, taking in Dean and the clown with the back end of a stake protruding out of him. Sam tried to stand up but the nausea prevented him from doing so. Instead, he crawled to the clown's still form and watched it anxiously looking for any signs of life. For a long moment there was nothing, no rise of chest, no eye movement, and Dean was just starting to relax when there was a bright light coming from the clown's mouth. A long continuous stream of lights that broke into dozens of lights on the ceiling. All but two streamed away out of the walls and the other two stayed on the ceiling for a moment before one of them went to Sam and flew into his mouth, filling him up. Sam eyes focused on the remaining light though, the one still on the ceiling, he knew who it was.

"Peter." he said and made to get up onto his feet, only to remember as he crashed back down that there was a reason he hadn't done so before. Sam hit head again and knocked himself unconscious.

Dean looked up at the light as well. It was so bright, he heard his brother say 'Peter' and he knew then that that must be what the light was Peter. Peter had lived in the creature this whole time being unable to move on? That sucked. Dean was so caught up in his own thoughts he hadn't noticed Sam try to get up until he was falling back down.

Dean was at Sam's side in moments and cradled his brother's head with his lap while his fingers and ears checked for Sam's breathing and pulse. Thankfully Sam had both, although they were both irregular. He looked at his brother's head, which was bleeding. If he wasn't so worried, or if Sam had been conscious, he might have made a crack about matching head wounds since both Dean's and Sam's head wounds were pretty much in the same spot on their heads.

Dean shifted both Sam and himself so that he could leverage Sam as best he could and stood up with Sam. Sam was heavy and his head was not a fan out of this trying to carry Sam thing, but they couldn't' stay there. Sam needed help and he would give it to him and if necessary they would go to the hospital, but only if it was necessary. It had only been a few months ago the leviathans that had worn their faces had gone on a killing spree, after all. Dean looked at the stairs and realized there was no way he was going to be able to carry Sam up there, especially with the horror that lied on the other. Dean with his own injuries wasn't going to be able to get Sam out without at least some help. He jumped suddenly when a boy appeared beside him, flickering a little.

"Let me help." the boy said, he couldn't be more than nine years old but Dean didn't trust ghosts and the kid seemed to notice that.

"Sam was my best friend, my only real friend, let me help," the ghost said earnestly. Dean didn't want to, but he couldn't do it by himself and the only other way would be to wake Sam up, which he didn't want to do. Dean nodded reluctantly. The kid grabbed Sam as well and some of the weight was lifted off Dean. With Peter's help Dean was more able to make his way up the stairs.

He winced as the sight he had gone through to get to Sam assaulted his eyes again. Only this time he saw more of it since he had been running to get to Sam and now he was walking slowly. There was blood all over the hallways, thankfully the bodies weren't in plain sight, but the smell, the smell was enough. He made a mental note to call the police as soon as they left town, which hopefully would be soon since he didn't want Sam to stay here any longer than he had to after what he had gone through. Dean finally saw the door and the boy ghost helped him until he got there then the boy stopped a few feet shy of freedom.

"What?" Dean asked, annoyed. His brother weighed a ton and Dean was taking most of the weight, especially since sometimes the kid went incorporeal again sending Dean staggering for a few second before he turned corporeal again. Which he knew wasn't the kids fault, he had spent the first 25 of his ghost hood trapped inside that thing that looked...like a clown.

Dean stopped himself as Sam 's clown fear suddenly made sense. His intense fear of them, his inability to be around them and he hadn't even gotten the full story yet. Dean was starting to feel bad for every time he had made fun of Sam for his phobia of clown, because apparently Sam's fear of clown wasn't irrational at all. Dean shook his head and reached for the doorknob only to find himself off balance as the ghost vanished. Dean barely managed to keep himself and his brother from falling over and as soon he steadied them he shouted to the ceiling.

"Thanks for the warning." he said sarcastically. Dean opened the door without any help was even more work, but Dean finally managed to get the door open. He helped his brother to the back door of the borrowed car where it was a struggle to open that door as well but finally managed. Dean as carefully as he could with the amount of energy he had left laid Sam down across the backseat.

Dean sighed in exhaustion; he hadn't slept since he had gotten out of the hospital. He wiped a hand over his head and looked at it. It wasn't just sweat coming off of it but blood as well, Dean sighed, oh well, he'd have to deal with that later when there wasn't a brother that needed him.

Dean closed the door and started to make his way to driver's seat before he stopped to look at the house. There was nothing on the outside of the house that indicated the horror that was inside of it. He supposed he probably shouldn't have been so irritated at the ghost since it was the ghost's basement that the clown creature had been holding Sam in. The ghost kid probably had a lot of bad memories of the place. Dean was just glad that he had checked out the house. He had checked out their old one, the school, the library before he had checked out the kid's house.

Dean knew that there were a lot of things his brother hadn't told him, and as soon as he was well enough Dean was going to get those answers out of him. With that in mind Dean made his way around the borrowed car and got into the drivers seat. He reached over the back seat to make sure Sam was still breathing and still had a pulse. When he found out that Sam had both he turned back around and started the car, intent on driving the two of them back towards their motel.


	18. Chapter 18

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: I don't own Supernatural.
> 
> A/N: Sorry that's it's taken such a long time.

 

Dean grumbled as he pulled into the parking lot and saw that most of the spots close to the motel room were full. He was going to have to carry his brother again and now there were people around that might see that they were both bleeding. Dean was mentally preparing himself for what was to come when he heard a small gasp of pain come from the backseat. Dean turned his head so fast he bit back a groan as his neck complained of the sudden movement.

"Sam, are you okay?" Sam looked around confused for a moment before his face went blank and Dean knew he remembered what had happened. Sam's eyes flickered around again.

"Where's Peter?" Dean reminded himself he meant the ghost.

"He helped me carry you to the door before he split." Dean said and tried to keep the grumble out of his voice knowing that Sam and Peter had been friends and if he knew his brother Sam was probably feeling guilty about Peter, not to mention that they had been in Peter's house. Sam nodded and looked around again.

"We're back at the motel?" Sam asked a little confused and Dean nodded but was worried that his brother might have a concussion. Sam nodded too but only once then stopped.

"How's your head?" Dean asked even though he was pretty sure that the answer was not good. Sam lifted one of hand up to feel the wound then dropped it quickly.

"It hurts." Sam said shortly and Dean nodded.

"You think you can walk to the motel room from here without falling like you did last time?" Dean asked with a small hint of a tease in his voice. Sam nodded and sat himself up, wincing in a way that Dean knew that he was going to be within reach all the way to the motel room, even if Sam complained about it. Dean got out of the Impala and made his way around to the side where Sam was also getting out of the Impala. Sam managed to not to sway too much on his feet and he shut the door. Dean kept close to Sam as they made their way back to the motel and when Sam stumbled Dean forced himself to wait a second for Sam to catch himself, which he did. They made their way into the room, Dean holding the door open for Sam.

"Ladies first." Dean said although he wasn't feeling a lot like joking, it was mostly just an automatic reaction. Sam didn't respond at all, which let him know just how dark it was in his brother's head at the moment. Dean gestured Sam to the table and Sam went without complaint, furthering his worry for his brother's state of mind.

"Wait here." he told Sam and Sam nodded. Dean made his way back to the Impala, this time much faster now that he didn't have to make sure that his gigantor of a brother wasn't going to hurt himself more. Dean grabbed the First Aid kit from the trunk and made his way back to the motel where Sam was still sitting, Dean doubted that Sam had moved an inch.

Dean sighed but grabbed the chair Sam wasn't on and put it across from Sam. He sat down on the chair and put the First Aid kit on the table. He used some cloths from the kit to clean the still-wet blood from off his brother's face. Sam's eyes were focused exclusively on a point of the floor. Dean then took the alcohol from the kit and showed it to Sam, it took several second before his brother's eyes focused on it and few more before he nodded giving him permission.

Dean nodded and poured it into the wound and watched as his brother's body tensed in little in pain. He hated this part. The part where he had to cause his brother pain in order to fix him up, but he also knew it was necessary. He took out a needle from the kit and showed it to his brother as well who nodded. Dean, as quickly and neatly as he could drew three stitches into his brother's head. He then placed gauze over the stitches and folded it around the bottom before bringing out the bottle of the good stuff, pointing it towards Sam who shook his head.

"Sam," Dean said.

"You're injured too, Dean. I'm not taking anything until you're fixed up too." He could argue, but he knew from experience it wouldn't get him anywhere so he just gave up too tired to fight at the moment.

"Fine," Dean said. Sam nodded and repeated the process on Dean's head that Dean had done on Sam's. Dean bit back the hiss when Sam cleaned his wound and gripped the sides of the chair hard as Sam stitched his forehead. The two of them had matching gauze bandages on their foreheads now. Dean held out the pills again and Sam was still reluctant to take them.

"It was the deal. I let you stitch me up you take the pills." Dean said. Sam sighed he got up and searched through the bag and brought back out a bottle of Aspirin.

"Sam." Dean said rearing up for an argument, but Sam interrupted him.

"I'm not taking that. I'll take pills, but I'm not taking that." He wanted to argue but decided against it again. Sam had had a long day. He looked tired, he was probably going to conk out soon and that would help him. Dean knew he should probably wait, but knew at the same if he did the likelihood of getting answer went down significantly because his brother didn't always want to talk about these kinds of things.

"So what was that all about?" he asked. He had figured some of it out for himself, but he still wasn't sure of the whole picture. Sam looked at the same spot on the floor he had looked at the whole time Dean had been stitching his forehead.

"It's all my fault," Sam said softly. It was funny that that comment was slightly relieving because it sounded a bit more like his brother. The whole I don't feel guilt thing because what I went through in the cage had been nice while it lasted, but it had also been unlike Sam. Dean could argue but until he knew what Sam was talking about he couldn't really do it effectively, so he just nodded like he was accepting it.

"Okay. Now tell me why." Sam looked up at him then back down at the floor.

"He chose me." Sam said speaking more to the floor than to him, but that was okay he could work with that.

"Who chose you for what?" Dean asked although he had a vague idea.

"The Clown, Am-heh. He was summoned by a someone who had no idea what they were doing and didn't bind him correctly. He escaped, but he was bound to the town until he completed a sacrifice and he chose me." Dean did not like the sound of

Dean did not like the sound of that, but he didn't speak, he just waited for Sam to go on which he did after a few moments. Sam looked at him for a moment his eyes full of sorrow.

"I forgot. How could I forget?" Sam asked him full of self-loathing. "I forget him. I forgot everything." Dean still wasn't sure what Sam was talking about. It was a bit of a leap from what he had just been talking about.

"What did the clown want?" Sam had used another name, but Dean didn't remember it, again, he had a good idea but wanted to hear it from Sam, Sam winced.

"Me. My soul. It was part of a three part thing, each part happening on the full moon, but we moved before he could complete it." Dean tried to breathe and think about it calmly and rationally, but it didn't work.

"You mean he was attacking you for three month back when we lived here and you didn't say anything?!"Dean yelled furiously. "Did you ever think at any time, that you live with two hunters that maybe they could" Dean shrugged "I don't know help you with it." Sam looked down and back up at him, then back down.

"What?" Dean asked not liking the way Sam had looked at him.

"Nothing." Sam said but Dean wasn't born yesterday and he didn't believe that for a moment.

"What?!" Dean shouted, because sometimes it was the only way to get a straight answer from his stubborn brother.

"Do you remember the stomachaches you had here?" Sam asked. Dean frowned and he thought back. Yeah, he had gotten a few bad stomachaches there but they were just stomach aches. Except for the one he had when they were trying to leave, he had thought for a little while that his appendix was about to explode, and then suddenly the pain had just stopped.

"Yeah, but stomachaches happen," Dean said with a shrug. Sam shook his head.

"Not the ones that happened here." Dean frowned, as he understood what Sam was saying.

"You're saying that clown, he did that to me?" Dean asked and Sam nodded affirmatively.

"He said that if I told you he would kill you. If I let you know even in a small way he would hurt you." Sam admitted. Dean took a minute to process that. He wished that Sam had told him. Dean knew though that if the tables were reversed and Sam had been the one who be hurt or his Dad he would have kept his mouth shut as well. That didn't mean he had to like it though.

"So he came to visit you three times in the middle of the night. I guess that would scare me too," he said and Sam looked down again and Dean's jaw hardened.

"Sam, it was just the three times right?" Sam took in a deep breath and looked up and shook his head.

"He was around all the time, taunting me like Lucifer does now." Dean closed his eyes he wanted to kill that clown all over again. The clown hadn't just taunted and hurt his full-grown smart brother. He had mentally tortured and taunted his nine-year-old venerable younger brother for two and a half months. He hadn't noticed anything; he had thought that it was all because of hunting and that damn movie.

No wonder Sam was so scared of clowns. It all made sense now. Sam had been a kid. Just a kid when this whole thing had happened, and no kid or adult deserved that kind of crap put on them especially his brother. "Only he could actually hurt people," Sam added after a moment. Great, another thing. Peter the little kid that had helped him get Sam to the car; of course Sam blamed himself for Peter's death.

"What happened to Peter?" Dean asked needing to hear what Sam thought about it.

"Peter was my friend. He was my friend and he was being hurt and I hadn't even realized it not until now. The memories, I hide them, because they scared me so much but being around him" the way he said him made it obvious that he was speaking about the clown not Peter " woke them back up." Dean nodded he felt slightly better about that now Sam hadn't come here stupidly, he had just made himself forget, but he was sure Sam was beating himself up about that as well.

"Am-heh took an interest in him- I think I forgot to mention that on each full moon he had to take a soul when he took part of mine. Am-heh took his soul because of me because I was friends with him." Dean shook his head he had come up with a different theory. One that he hadn't thought too much about since he had been so frantically looking for Sam, but he thought it was a better theory.

"What about the other kid, the girl. Did you know her?" Sam looked at surprised.

"I had to find you," Dean said explaining why he knew about her.

"No, not really," Sam admitted slowly.

"I think the clown, Am-heh" he corrected himself because every time he said the clown Sam winced. "He took kids he thought that people wouldn't look for. The girl was a runaway and I think he figured that anything could have happened to her. The boy, well you know what was going on with him." Dean said because he wasn't sure how well Sam would handle it. " I think that he thought that could easily pin in on the father and that's what happened. The Dad went to prison and died there for killing his son. Not that I really feel bad for the bastard because he did hurt his son. I think that he was trying not to attract attention."

"Which he stopped doing as soon as I left," Sam said shaking his head. "He was trying to pull me back here. He told me about all the people that died in order to for him to bring me back here." Dean nodded; he had seen all the victims in newspapers and stuff.

"I should have never come back here," Sam said. Dean wasn't sure about that. While he had nearly lost Sam, he had also killed the clown and he knew something that Sam would be happy about.

"But coming back here did do something."

"What? Kill more people?" Sam asked bitterly.

"No," Dean said with a shake of his head " you released their souls." Sam frowned at him and Dean realized that Sam had actually been unconscious when the light show had happened.

"It happened after you were knocked out. Am-heh released the souls." Sam frowned.

"That's why Peter was there?" Sam asked and Dean nodded.

"Yeah, he's free now. They all are." Sam's face brightened for a moment before darkening, no doubt having something new to blame himself for.

"But I still could have stopped it. If I would have told you-" Dean had enough of this he had to stop this before this got any worse.

"Sam, you were nine years old nine, nine, Nine! You didn't think the way an adult would. The clown scared you and so of course you did what it said you were a kid!" Dean yelled hoping to get through his brother's thick skull.

"You wouldn't have. You'd have found a way." Dean shook his head.

"At nine years old and if that thing had been threatening you if I stepped out of line, you bet your ass that I would have kept my mouth shut, especially since you and even I now had no idea what it was. " Dean wasn't really sure about that, but he needed Sam to stop beating himself about it. Sam had done the best he could at that age with his amount of maturity and his knowledge of the situation. Sam hadn't even been hunting yet; he just researched at that point.

"It's a god from the underworld. At least in mythology." Sam said clarifying whom that clown had really been or, at least, trying to as Am-heh didn't ring any bells. Sam didn't look convinced Dean wondered what else he had to tell his brother to get him to believe him. However at that moment, Sam yawned. Dean knew that it was probably time to wrap up this conversation up for the night and approach it again tomorrow morning, or probably afternoon since was past midnight.

"This isn't over, but you need sleep." Dean said and Sam looked for a half a second like he was going to argue, but simply got up from the chair and made his way to his bed. Sam took off his shoes and got into bed, otherwise fully clothed. Dean smiled a little at that even as he went to the bathroom to get ready for bed. By the time he got out of the bathroom, Sam was already softly snoring.


	19. Chapter 19

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't own Supernatural.

Sam's eyes opened and he searched the room for a moment, relaxing when cheap wallpaper and thin comforters met his eyes. He looked over at Dean and found him asleep in the bed next to his. Sam sighed, Dean had tried to talk him out of feeling guilty last night using his age. If he had been a normal 9 years old he would have agreed, but he was part of a family of hunters, he should have told them he had just been too scared. If he had told them then no one else would have been hurt. Sam looked at the windows and found that Dean had closed them so only a little sunlight from the outside made it into their motel room.

Sam swung his legs out of bed and touched them to the ground. As he pulled himself out of the bed he looked around the room trying to find something else to focus on that wasn't his guilt or his thoughts about last night or 20 years ago. Sam decided to make some coffee, hoping that even motel coffee might make this more tolerable and would distract him for a bit. It did but since it didn't take terribly long to make instant coffee it didn't distract him for long. It wasn't long at all before he was pouring the cheap coffee into one the little cardboard cups that the motel provided. Starbucks was definitely better, but this was better than nothing.

Sam found himself wanting to go on another run. Lucifer hadn't come back yet, but it had helped him with that. However, he couldn't go in his jeans so he dug through his clothes until he found some clothes he could exercise comfortably in. After he got changed he looked over at his brother then dug through the motel drawer until he came up with a pen and paper. He scrawled a quick note that he was going to go for a run, because Dean would not appreciate waking up and not finding him there with no note.

Sam also took his cell phone in case Dean really needed to get a hold of him. He opened the door. The heat was a bit hotter than it had been in the last few days and slightly warmer than normal fall weather. However, his thoughts soon became about his heart rate and breathing. It was the main reason he liked to run, because it gave him something else to focus on for a little bit that it made him feel good. He was starting to get a little tired and he decided to turn back around and go back to the motel. He was jogging across the parking lot when he saw him and stopped. Peter was standing in front of the door to his motel. Sam found himself moving without even realizing it and soon came to a stop right in front of Peter.

"Peter," he said not really sure what to say. He looked exactly the same as he had the last time he had seen him, except for the slight flickering that occasionally happened which was the only way to know that he was, in fact, a ghost.

"I wanted to talk to you last night but…" Peter gestured to the door and windows.

"The salt," Sam said and Peter nodded. Sam looked around and while there was no one around at the moment that didn't mean that there wouldn't be anyone around. Normally he didn't talk to ghosts, didn't trust them because most of the ghost they dealt with were hurting people and were usually on their list of things to eliminate, but Peter, Peter had just been a poor kid that had unfortunately known him like Jessica. However, he wasn't sure that Dean would see it that way since they usually had a strict no ghosts allowed rule.

Sam took his cell phone and out of his pocket and scrolled down the list to Dean's current number and put the phone to his head. He caught Peter looking at the phone but only for a moment before his eyes focused on the whole of Sam.

"Sam?" Dean answered sounding like he was drinking something while he was talking.

"Yeah, it's me," Sam answered.

"Where are you?"

"Right outside the motel room."

"You forget your key?" Dean asked.

"Not exactly," that caught Dean's attention.

"What going on Sam?" Dean asked.

"Can you clear the salt out?" he asked unsure if his brother was going to go for it.

"What?" Dean asked.

"Peter came and I want to talk to him without an audience," Sam said and there was a long pause on the phone.

"Okay, but I'm keeping the rock salt gun right by me," Dean said then hung up. Sam smiled at Peter who gave him a small cautious smile. A couple of minutes later the door opened and Sam walked inside. After a long moment of hesitation, Peter crossed the threshold too and looked around the motel room. Dean true to his word had the rock salt shotgun laid across his lap easily accessible if Peter decided to show that his time being lost inside of an evil clown had made him evil as well, which he had to admit there was a possibility, a small one.

"You saved us," Peter said to Dean who after a moment nodded.

"We never thought we would get out," Peter said and Sam felt his mood sink again. It was because of him that they had been trapped in the first place. "But we are free now, all of us. Soon, I'll get to see my mom soon." Peter added with a smile Sam smiled a bittersweet smile back at him Dean could tell that Sam was sorry that he had died so early in his life but was happy that he'd finally be with a family member who cared unlike his father.

"You're my best friend," the small boy said and Sam's smile turned a little less bitter.

"I wish I could have stopped this," Peter nodded

"I know you do. I've seen you at various time in your whole life." Dean and Sam both frowned at that.

"Am-heh couldn't leave, but he could see everything and we saw what he saw."

"Everything," Sam asked softly and Peter nodded.

"Most of it was bad, but we got to see you saving people," he said brightly.

"You spent 20 years inside of a clown because of me," Sam said and Dean almost rolled his eyes it was like talking to a brick wall sometimes when Sam got something into his head, it was a bitch trying to get it out. Peter shook his head.

"I spend a long time just thinking and here's what I thought of. What if it had been someone else anyone that was the final sacrifice?"

Sam frowned, wouldn't that be better? Someone else surely they would have done a better job than he had.

"How would that be better?" Sam asked voicing his thoughts aloud.

"Your family hunts."

"Yeah, but I didn't tell anyone," Sam said shaking his head.

"You left."

"What?"

"Because you left he had to stay, which made everyone outside Pleasant Grove safe."

"But it didn't make you or anyone else in this town safe," Sam countered with a shake of his head.

"Did you even think about how bad it would have been if he had been able to leave? He had to, at least, try to somehow hide his kills here. Only a small number a year versus hundreds or millions if he had been let out. Nothing would have been able to stop him; nothing would have been able to free us."  Sam frowned as he thought about Peter's words. Peter shook his head looking very earnest.

"You didn't release him and because of you he didn't kill as many people as he would have without you." Sam wasn't sure about that even though he was considering it more than he had last night. At the moment, it didn't matter because all he could think about was Peter right now who was a ghost.

"Yeah, but if it wasn't for me you wouldn't be a ghost." Peter smiled.

"You don't know that." There were times Peter seemed his age, and other times when he seemed older.

"I'm sorry. I'm really sorry." Sam said earnestly as Peter was actually the first person in a long line of people that he had caused the death of. At least this time, even though Peter was dead he was still to talk to him the way he hadn't been able to with most of them.

Peter nodded a little stiffly then his gaze went to the floor, and then looked off to the right to the window. He walked towards the window moving his hand towards the curtains like he was trying to pull them back, only, his hand to go through them. Peter looked down at his hands with a sad and slightly puzzled look on his face. He moved his hand so that it hit the little light that was shining through the curtains.

"You did your best," he said moving his hand through the small beam of light. "I doubt many people could have done better…. I can't feel it," he said sounding, even more, confused.

"You're a ghost." Dean said and Sam glared at him for a moment before looking back at Peter who was still looking at the light. Peter's frown deepened. Sam closed the distance between the two of them and was about to put his hand on Peter's shoulder when he realized that it probably wouldn't help.

"Ghost." Peter echoed faintly. "Sam, where's my mom?" he looked up looking again like the child he was when he had died. He jerked his head to the other side of the room and then was gone a moment later. Sam stared at the spot that Peter had disappeared from and then made his way to the door.

"Where are you going?" Dean asked him.

"Peter is my responsibility. Until he moves on I have to watch out for him which means that I have to find him." Sam said and then heard a sigh behind him and then quick footsteps."Alright, let's find him." Dean said and followed him out the door.

"Alright let's find him." Dean said and followed him out the door.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks so much for reading please let me know what you think :)


	20. Chapter 20

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't own Supernatural.

"I've got to find him," Sam said softly as he looked out the windows of the vehicle as if Peter was just going to appear, which, well, he was a ghost so he technically could, but Dean had a better idea about where the ghost kid had gone especially considering what he was talking about when he vanished. Dean had to do the research since Sam wasn't focused enough to do it as he was too worried and full of guilt about the ghost kid. But if he was right they'd find the kid soon enough. The drive didn't take long, but he could tell that his brother was anxious by the way he drummed his fingers across the dashboard again and again. If he didn't know what was eating at Sam he would have to tell him to quit it.

It took another ten minutes before they made their way to their destination. Dean really hoped that he was right, cause if he wasn't he was probably going to end up yelling at his brother even though he knew, at least, some of what was going on his little brother's head.

_Oak Park Cemetery_

The sign greeted them as they made their way in the graveyard. It was daylight. They more familiar with graveyards at night, but this was not the first time that they had been in a graveyard during the day either. The variety of tombstones was the first thing that caught their eyes. There were many of the traditional ones, and there were some of the not so traditional ones as well. But the tombstones weren't what they had come for. Dean drove slowly around the nearly vacant cemetery. There weren't any funerals going on, there was only one other car in the place and to his relief, they were getting back into their car. Good, that way if the ghost kid showed up was there they wouldn't be making a scene. Dean paused as he saw a flicker out of the corner of his eye and looked to where the flicker had been. There he was ghostly Pete standing in front of a grave. He kept the ghostly Pete name to himself as he was pretty sure that Sam wouldn't appreciate it.

"Peter," Sam said striding forward, Dean followed him and they stopped in front of a grave.

_Miranda Parkman_

_Loving wife and mother_

Poor ghost kid, he looked at the stone so sadly like it had just happened and not like it had been years ago. His form kept flickering as he looked at the stone. Dean stayed silent; he looked to his brother who was looking from the grave to the ghost kid.

"Peter," he finally said aloud and Peter's attention turned to his brother.

"I thought that she would be here waiting for me, but she's not," the kid said sadly and he could see how much that small short statement hurt his brother, but he stayed silent this was between Sam and the kid, for now at least.

"She is waiting for you, she just might not be waiting here," Peter's eyes drifted back to the stone.

"She was the best, why did she have to die?" the ghost's eyes started watering. Sam gave him a look that plainly said 'can I get a minute alone with him'. Dean nodded knowing they were going to have a chick flick moment; he was fine with giving them as much room as they wanted. He made his way back to the car and settled on watching the two carefully close enough in case Peter decided to attack his brother but far enough away that he couldn't hear them talk.

"I lost my mother too," Sam said as soon as Dean was far away enough. It was hard enough to talk about their mother without talking about her in front of Dean. "I don't really remember her, at least, when I was young-" he cut himself off as he didn't really want to explain how he had gotten to her in the past.

"But where is she?" Peter asked him.

"She's in the light, in order to see her you have to cross over," Sam said. He didn't do the crossover speech as often as you might think that someone in his line of work would, but he still knew the basics. The only problem this time with the speech wasn't he wasn't sure he wanted his friend to crossover yet. Peter blinked.

"Right," he said, "crossover; find peace. How do I do that?" the kid looked pensive.

He didn't really know from personal experience, all the times he had died he had never tried to find peace when he was dead. Aloud he said,

"Do you see a light?" He was so glad that Dean was far enough away so that he couldn't hear him, he would probably make ghost whisperer cracks at him. Peter looked around the graveyard for a few moments before looking back at the grave.

"No," Sam nodded not sure how else to get him to crossover.

"Do you have any unfinished business?" he asked as the thought popped in this head. Peter slowly shook his head.

"I had to talk to you, let you know it wasn't your fault but other than that, there's nothing keeping me here."

"How can it not be my fault?" Sam said again before he could stop himself. Peter frowned at him for a long moment.

"Was it my fault?" Sam frowned back wondering how Peter could think that.

"Of course not. You had no idea what it was, you didn't even know about monsters and ghosts."

"No, not the clown," he said with a sake of his small head but he sounded again less like the kid that he should be. "My Dad," Sam swallowed at the reminder that Peter's Dad had been beating him and he hadn't even known, he had taken Peter's word about everything even when it was obvious that it wasn't the truth. How had he not seen it as a kid when it was right there? He broke out of his thoughts and looked back at his friend who was looking at him for an answer.

"Of course, it's not your fault. Your Dad was- it's your Dad's fault," he said. Peter nodded.

"But I knew it was bad. I knew that he shouldn't be doing it and if I would have told anyone I would have stopped him," Sam stared at Peter for a moment; this definitely wasn't the nine-year-old side of the ghost. Peter smiled a knowing smile that didn't belong on his nine-year-old ghost face.

"It's not the same thing," Sam denied.

"What's different?" He asked quirking his head to the side looking more like the nine-year-old. A dozen different responses ran through his head. You were a kid, you didn't know any better, he was bigger than you, but all of those could just as easily be turned back on him so he used the only that couldn't.

"He was your Dad. You were supposed to be able to trust him and you probably loved him,"

"I did," Peter nodded "but you can't tell me that it wouldn't have been better for me if I had told," another response that was wiser than his nine-year-old face. "We can't go back in time, not this time," Peter said with a small smile indicating that he knew that Sam had gone back to the past before. "You will never know what would have happened if you had told, just like I will never know what would have happened if I had said anything about my Dad."

"Then what are we supposed to do?" Sam asked then realized he was asking a dead nine-year-old-ghost for advice.

"Move on," the ghost said and looked down at the grave again "no matter how scary it seems. His eyes turned solemn again with a hint of fear. "You've been in both heaven and Hell, how was it?" Sam didn't know how to answer that because honestly neither of which were experiences that he liked to think about. The cage with Lucifer had given him a permanent hallucination and heaven had created a huge rift between him and his brother who had nearly killed their bond in a way he never thought was possible. "What if she's not there?" he said looking at the tombstone his eyes full of fear. Sam put his hand lightly on the ghost's shoulder or at least where it would be if he were corporeal.

"Everything will be fine," he assured him. While Heaven and Hell hadn't worked out for him, he was pretty sure Heaven worked out fine for other people and Peter deserved a happy ending after everything that life had put him through. Peter's didn't look away from his mother's tombstone for a long moment but then his eyes settled on him.

"You were my first and only friend. No one else was willing to look past my shy demeanor and see me," Sam felt tears coming to his eyes, but he did his best to furiously blink them back. He remembered conversations in the library, playing with him and how much he had cared about him.

"Well you were worth it," he said his voice breaking.

"So were you," Peter said with a wide smile on his face. He turned towards the sun and Sam had a feeling that Peter was about to leave him. Part of him wanted to stop him, but he knew what happened to spirits who didn't leave when it was time to and he didn't want that to happen to his friend. So he was just going to have to watch his friend leave and hope that he would finally have peace after all this time. Peter suddenly turned back around again.

"I need you to tell me that you'll be fine," Sam blinked at that unexpected demand. He wasn't sure that he could do that. After everything else, the cage, the hallucination of Lucifer, this honestly seemed like it could be the straw that broke the camel's back. But Peter seemed to need him to tell him that it was going to be okay and it wasn't the first time he lied to protect someone.

"I'll be fine," he said with conviction that he didn't feel. Peter smiled and a moment later he was gone. Sam scanned the cemetery to make sure that he hadn't just moved somewhere else, but he was pretty sure that his friends had moved on. He looked around the cemetery again for no particular reason. Hopefully, he was happy now, or at least at peace. He walked away from the tombstone of his dead friends mother and towards his brother. Thankfully, Dean seemed to notice that this wasn't a good moment to joke instead as he approached all Dean asked was.

"So is he gone?" Sam nodded. He was gone now; he would never be able to talk to him again.

"You okay?" Dean asked. Sam didn't answer and just walked past him to the car.


	21. Chapter 21

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: I don't own Supernatural.

 

"So what do you want to do?" Dean asked as he settled into the driver's seat. Honestly, Sam had no idea. He was barely wrapping his mind around any of this much less being able to form any kind of plan.

"You want to just get out of here?" Dean asked, sounding more than a little hopeful. Sam nodded; it was what he wanted more than anything to put this town in his rearview mirror and never come back but there were loose ends to tie up.

"We have loose ends," Sam said and Dean nodded, sighing.

"Where is he?" Sam suddenly asked as now he knew what he wanted to do. Dean looked at him for a second as he said.

"He's dead, you don't have to worry about him,"

"No, his body, Where's his body?"

"He's still there I guess," Dean said looked over him concerned. Sam nodded

"We have to cover ourselves which means we have to get rid of the body in case there's anything off about it," Sam said like it was purely business, he was pretty sure neither of them believed that. In reality, he had to make sure that the body was still there. They hadn't dealt with many beings with this amount of power and he had to make sure that Am-heh hadn't pulled a Gabriel.

"Sam, that's a bad idea returning to the scene again. The cops might have already been called, someone could have seen me carry you out of the house," Sam nodded.

"I get that, I really do, but I need to go back," Dean looked at him and then pulled over to the side of the road.

"Sam, this clown thing terrorized you, and it's where it almost killed you. Aside from it being a tactically stupid decision why do you want to go back there?"

"I need to make sure he's still there," he realized that wasn't all " and you killed him, I need to burn his body." Dean gave him that mother hen look that normally frustrated him and warmed him, right now it was just frustrated him.

"Okay, but since we're taking a dead body out of there and you need to simmer down a little, we're going to wait till dark." Sam nodded but he wasn't happy about it. Part of him feared that if they waited the Clown was going to rise up and come after them again, but Dean was right. They couldn't get a dead body out of there as easily in the middle of the day as they could in the dark. It was only a few hours, but it was going to be a long wait.

* * *

Sam shivered as he walked down the hallway. It was covered in splashes of blood, arterial spray and just big puddles of it everywhere. The smell was making his stomach churn slightly as the hallway was full of the coppery smell as well as the smell of the thankfully unseen dead bodies that the blood used to belong to. Even more people who had died because of him. Sam considered that this was probably one of the reasons that Dean had been so against him coming back here; this was proved further when Dean said.

"Sam, it's not your fault," Sam didn't answer as the two of them made their way down the hallway holding flashlights in one hand and guns in the other, just to be on the safe side. The two of them made their way down the now silent hall and Sam did his best not to look at the blood or focus on the smell. Minutes later they were in front of stairs that went both up and down. Dean went first; Sam only steps behind him as they descended into the dark basement. This time, though he had a flashlight with him though and he flicked it around the area. Blood, three of four different small puddles of blood coming from the two brothers and thankfully the still very dead clown who still had the stake inside his body. Some of the tension he had been feeling all day suddenly left his body, as he knew that the clown was really dead and hadn't just faked it.

He would deal with Am-heh later, but first of all, he had to get rid of his and Dean's blood before they called the cops so that this wouldn't be attached to their records as well. He paused though as memories from last night started drifting through his head. The clown taunting him, the clown about to kill him, and all the pain that the clown had put him through. His grip tightened on his flashlight, as the white-hot rage raced through him. He looked down at Am-heh's body. The creature had killed Peter, and had terrorized him for so long. Sam hated him so much but there was nothing he could do about it now. The only thing he could do was make sure that he and Dean weren't implicated in more murders

With that in mind, he traded his gun for a bottle of bleach out of his duffle bag and sprayed and wiped down the whole area. When he was done getting rid of any evidence that either of them had been there he turned to the body on the floor.

The next thing he took out was a tarp, which he laid on the floor. The two brothers lifted the dead body onto the tarp and wrapped him up in it. Sam nodded to Dean and the two of them picked the body up and headed back up the stairs. Soon they deposited the tarp-covered body into the back of the car. The ride of out of town was silent, there wasn't even a song playing on the radio or cassette deck. They had already packed up their hotel before they had left and both were glad to be leaving this town once and for all, even if the younger's mind was also occupied by the events that had happened there.

They drove for four hours before Dean pulled over. The two brothers easily set up a pyre with the clown as it middle. After making sure that it would burn Dean returned from the vehicle with the final ingredients: gasoline and salt. He backed away from the two items as Sam stepped forwards. Sam was glad that Dean wasn't fighting him on this. He took the gasoline and splashed in liberally over the wood and Am-heh's body. He splashed it more than it really needed to and knew that due to the amount of accelerant he was using they were probably going to have to stand for around for a while. Thankfully they were in the middle of nowhere so no one should be around. He threw down the gasoline can when there was no more gas in it and picked up the salt. He shook it over the area liberally as well but not nearly as much as the gas. Sam looked to his brother and held his hand out for the lighter. Dean after a moment handed to him. Sam walked to the pyre and grab one of the sticks that he hadn't drenched and walked back to Dean. It took a few times for him to light it but he did and because the stick was made of dry wood it caught on fire fairly easily. He threw the stick onto the pyre, and watched it explode into a steady fireball.

"Woah, how much gas did you use on that thing?!" he heard Dean yelled alarmed from the side of him but he didn't look at his brother, instead he kept his attention on the fireball. Am-heh was burning. He wouldn't be able to come back. He would never be able to hurt him again, he was gone...but everything that happened wasn't. Peter and everyone else that had died weren't suddenly undead and there was nothing that he could do that about that. Move on. It was Peter had told him to do and that's what he knew that he had to do, however moving on was always easier said than done. He turned to his brother who was still looking at the orange angry flames.

"It's going to be okay. Just tell me that it's going to be okay. I need you to tell me that it's going to be okay whether or not you believe it." Dean's eyes scanned his own for a moment but he said.

"It's going to be fine Sam. Maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, maybe not a month from now but it will be okay," Sam nodded at him with a small tight smile on his face; it was what he needed to hear most.

"Thanks."

* * *

"I got a new case," Sam said. He had been looking for cases since they had left the pyre and gotten a new hotel. Unfortunately, Lucifer had come back on the car ride to the new hotel so due to both Lucifer and his thoughts about the events in Pleasant Grove he had wanted to get working as soon as possible. He handed what he had to Dean who looked it over briefly, he nodded and amended his last statement.

"Or rather it looks like it's connected to one of our old cases," Dean nodded after he finished reading what Sam had given him.

"Coeur d'Alene, at least it's not far." Sam nodded his agreement.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: All right this is the end. Thanks so much to everyone who has read this and I hope you enjoyed it :)

**Author's Note:**

> Please comment if you liked it.


End file.
